


she's got her own trajectory

by SilverHeart09



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Doctor!Whump, F/F, a lot of cuddles, human nature au, team tardis being supportive, thasmin, thirteen as a disaster human
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-10-22 06:19:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17657531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverHeart09/pseuds/SilverHeart09
Summary: On the run, it's up to Graham, Ryan and Yaz to keep the Doctor safe, hidden on Earth as a human.Which would be easy, if Yaz didn't have to watch the Doctor struggle with her feelings towards someone else whilst having dreams about a mysterious woman she once loved, their enemies getting closer to her with every passing day...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Back at it with the multi-chapter fics! 
> 
> This is going to roughly follow the Family of Blood except it's a different bunch of baddies. 
> 
> (I'm uploading this on my phone and can't tag properly but I'll do it when I get home - LOADS of Thasmin, Najia being a supportive mum, one-sided slow burn, a fair amount of whump and many, many cuddles.)
> 
> Story title is from Oxygen by Catfish and the Bottlemen, the whole song strikes me as very Thirteen. 
> 
> Also, I know that these human nature fics have the possibility of dragging on when we all know that we just want to see Thirteen turn Time Lord again so I'm going to try and get everything finished and rounded up in 6 chapters or less! (With a lot of Thasmin schenigans thrown in as well) 
> 
> Enjoy! :D

Ever since she could remember, Jane Smith had weird dreams.

They weren’t entirely confined to when she was sleeping, either. Sometimes she’d find herself staring out of a window and would suddenly picture a landscape behind the clear glass that was like nothing she could ever have imagined. Thick red grass, a burnt orange sun, buildings as tall as skyscrapers enclosed in a huge glass dome that sparkled in the sunlight. Sometimes she fancied she could even spy two young boys playing in the fields, chasing each other around and laughing.

Then she’d blink, or someone would distract her, and the image would be gone. 

At night the dreams were even weirder. They were never particularly clear and she would generally wake up with a feeling of discontentment, as though she was reaching for something she kept falling short of, some incredible understanding and knowledge of the universe that was just beyond her grasp. A sea of faces would rotate through her mind and she’d hear names that sounded both so wonderful and so sad. In most of the dreams she was running, some faceless assailant chasing her, gaining on her. Sometimes they caught up to her and she’d wake up with a shout, but other times she’d turn to face them head-on and they’d fall to the ground in fright in front of her, as though she was some terrible avenging god they were terrified of, begging for mercy.

The dreams weren’t always frightening though, in fact sometimes they were warm and safe and reassuring. She’d fall asleep and feel as though she was being held, as though someone was lying next to her with their arms wrapped tightly around her. Sometimes she could even feel their lips against hers, slow and soft and perfect. In the dream she’d feel blissful happiness but when she woke up the sense of loss would overwhelm her and she’d cry silently for a love she didn't know she was missing.

The dreams always left Jane a little disorientated and she usually had to hold herself for a few moments to reassociate, chanting the little mantra her therapist had taught her.

_ Jane. Teacher. Sheffield.  _

Name, occupation, place. It used to work but nowadays that feeling was still there, a rush of panic, of fear but not for herself, for others around her that were in danger. Sometimes it was too much to bear and only screaming into a cushion or running through the streets as fast as she could would help her burn off that pain, loneliness and neverending torment that had built up inside her.

This particular morning was no different. She was ripped from her dreams by a scream and bolted upright, that awful urge to  _ run far away  _ overcoming her until she threw herself out of bed, pulled on her running gear and ran, as hard and fast as she could. She was breathless and her legs were burning by the time she finally stopped, the sky hues of pink and red as the sun slowly began its ascent into the sky. She’d ran all the way up to the hills and the wind whipped her short hair around her face as she breathed in the crisp, morning air and gradually felt her heart slow until it was back into a normal rhythm. 

She stood for a moment, watching the city below slowly start to wake up, the sounds of traffic and car horns drifting slowly up towards her. She spotted an ambulance blaring through the streets and was almost able to follow its route all the way to the hospital.

She turned, ready to run back to her flat, and spotted another early riser. A man further down the hill. He was too far away to see properly but there was a bike on the grass next to him and he was looking up at her, his features a blur in the distance.

She waved at him and he tentatively waved back, hesitantly, as though he wasn’t sure if he should.

She tried to ignore that uncomfortable feeling of deja vu as she made her way back down the hill. 

* * *

Yaz leant against the side of her car and watched the school.

It was the end of the day and the playground was starting to fill with parents and their children. Yaz spotted a boy she’d gone to this school with talking to a parent. She remembered him as a shy teenager with pimples and a mop of ginger hair that he didn't seem to know how to style, but now he seemed more confident, his skin clear and hair tamed. He spotted her and waved cheerfully, the blue of his school lanyard bouncing against his chest. 

Jane came out after about thirty minutes, coat in one hand, handbag in the other, her blond hair catching the afternoon sun and her bright brilliant face split open in a smile as she laughed with one of the other teachers.

Yaz felt that familiar prickle of tears at the corner of her eyes, the pang in her heart that was always there but was so much worse when she saw the woman she loved.

The Doctor walked past and didn't even look at her.

Yaz quickly wiped the tears away as she caught her voice on the breeze, joking and laughing with the other teacher. She sounded so carefree, so happy. That voice could tear down civilisations, bring peace out of chaos, make people laugh, rip others a new one. In all their time together Yaz had never heard her sound so happy. The last time she’d seen her, when she was still the Doctor, she’d been screaming, face contorted in agony, an image that Yaz would never be able to shake from her mind as long as she lived.

She watched them walk to the end of the street, arms swinging so close by their sides that they were practically holding hands, then she turned and sat back into her patrol car, gripping the steering wheel tightly, trying to keep the tears at bay as she phoned Ryan.

_ ‘She out?’  _ he asked.

‘Yeah, just left. She’s with another teacher,’ Yaz said, looking out the window as the playground emptied, the last few children skipping happily home with their families.

_ ‘Cool, I’ll keep an eye out for her coming my way. TARDIS this evening?’ _

‘I can’t,’ Yaz said, pressing her head against her steering wheel in frustration. ‘I told mum I’d help her cook for Nani.’

_ ‘No worries, we’ll keep an eye on the old girl. You free tomorrow?’ _

‘Yeah, should be.’

_ ‘Amazing, see you then. Oh, and Yaz?’ _

‘Yeah?’

His tone changed, and he sounded gentle, kind and reassuring.  _ ‘We’re almost there, just another 2 weeks and we’ll have her back.’ _

Yaz nodded, twisting the wheel in her hands. ‘Yeah, you’re right. We’re almost there.’

_ ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’ _

He hung up and Yaz took a deep breath and turned the key in the ignition, the car roaring to life under her fingers. One quick stop at the police station to get changed and return the car and then home to see her family and her Nani. She missed them whenever they were off in the TARDIS, but being in close proximity with them all the time these days reminded her why she’d wanted to leave in the first place.

Well that, and the beautiful blonde alien who’d stolen her heart. 

* * *

‘How was work, love?’ her mum asked when Yaz walked through the door, kicking off her shoes and hanging up her bag in the hallway.

‘Oh, you know, more parking disputes.’

‘I could have sworn I saw your car near the school earlier,’ Najia said, and Yaz felt her heart leap into her throat.

‘Oh, yeah. We’ve had reports of kids smoking outside. Weed, that kind of stuff.’

‘Well that’s progress,’ Najia said supportively, nudging her eldest daughter’s arm. ‘You’re starting to branch out a little.’

‘From parking disputes to trying to stop underage students destroy their lungs,’ Yaz said dryly. ‘Truly what I joined the police for.’ 

She joined her mother in the kitchen and started to chop up onions and chillies, heating a pan and listening to the reassuring sizzle as she tipped the vegetables into it. She’d done this before with the Doctor, back on the TARDIS. Her friend had been insistent on learning how to make the Samosas Najia had cooked up on their last visit, and the kitchen was a mess by the time they were done, flour and bits of pastry everywhere. She’d never forget the expression on the Doctor’s face though when they’d tested their food on the boys and had received nothing but praise and enthusiasm. The look of pride that lingered when she smiled at Yaz, her eyes bright and smile wide, hair completely covered in flour.

_ Two more weeks, just two more weeks.  _

‘Yaz,’ Najia said, her voice gentle. ‘I heard you again last night.’ 

The nightmares had started a few days after returning home, the knowledge that she wouldn’t be able to travel, that she’d be stuck at home for five whole months suddenly crashing down hard around her ears. They would still see the Doctor, keeping an eye on her was important now more than ever, but she wouldn’t see them. She would look straight through them as though they weren’t there, as though they were ghosts from her memory. It had been hard, initially,  _ so  _ hard. Watching as she found her place in her new school, hiding in the crowd when she went out for a coffee, walking carefully behind her when she went food shopping on Sunday’s. She’d started off doing all of these things alone but recently one of the other teachers had started joining her. Alice, always bright and happy and shining, tossing her perfect black hair over her shoulder, finding any excuse to touch the Doc _ -Jane’s  _ arm. Gazing adoringly up at her, laughing at all of her jokes as though Jane was the most wonderful person in the universe.

Graham and Ryan were oblivious but Yaz knew the truth. Alice was falling for her, and she was worried that Jane was going the same way. 

‘It’s nothing,’ Yaz said to her mum, washing her hands free of the chilli residue on them and tucking an apron around her waist. ‘Just bad dreams.’

‘You never used to get bad dreams,’ Najia said softly.

Yaz shrugged, not able to meet her mum’s eyes, worried her face would betray her emotions. 

‘I’ve not seen the Doctor around for a while,’ Najia continued, cautiously, and Yaz felt the tears well up as she stirred the pan, keeping her back to her mother, trying to keep her breathing controlled.

‘Oh she’s about,’ she replied, her voice thick with emotion. ‘She’s got a lot on at the moment. You know, work and stuff.’

‘Funny,’ Najia said, easily seeing through the lie. ‘She didn't strike me as the type to have a full-time job.’

‘Can we drop it, please?’ Yaz asked quietly, unsure she’d be able to keep her emotions in check for much longer. ‘She’s fine, I’m fine. We’re all fine.’

There was silence for moment, broken only by the sizzling of the pan and the steady  _ chop chop chop  _ of Yaz’s knife on the chopping board.

‘You can talk to me about this stuff, you know,’ Najia said after a moment, a hand on her daughter’s shoulder. ‘Because I just want you to be happy, Yaz. That’s all I want. And the Doctor, mad as she was, made you happy.’

‘I will be happy, mum,’ Yaz said, allowing herself to be folded into her mother’s embrace. ‘It’s all a bit confusing at the moment, but it’s going to get better.’

‘Happiness shouldn’t have a start date, Yasmin,’ Najia whispered gently to her. ‘If there’s something in your life that’s stopping you from being happy now, remove it.’

A cheery hello called from the corridor, Hakim and Sonya back from picking up Umbreen, and Najia squeezed her daughter’s hand, carefully wiping away the tears that were dripping silently down Yaz’s face. 

‘I’m here for you,’ she said, kissing Yaz’s cheek. ‘Always.’

* * *

Standing in front of her mirror, Jane didn't have the first idea what to wear.

She’d never felt comfortable in a dress, she’d always viewed them as being impractical and so many of the damn things  _ didn't have pockets. _ Her hair was wavy from a shower and she decided to leave it like that rather than trying to style it straight, rummaging through her wardrobe with the water dripping down her neck. She pulled on a pair of skinny jeans and a dark jacket, matching it with a grey top embroidered with stars and scrutinised her reflection.

She hadn’t been sure about this date. Sure, Alice was nice and all and they got on really well, but there was a feeling deep inside her telling her that this was wrong. That she shouldn’t be doing this, that going on a date was a stupid thing to do. 

She almost, although she knew it was impossible given the fact that she was painfully single, felt as though she was cheating on the nameless and faceless lover from her dreams, the one that held in the night and kissed her and made her feel so safe and so loved.

‘I deserve to be happy,’ Jane told herself, firmly, fixing her earrings and checking she had her purse and keys in her handbag.

She bent to pick up a scarf from the floor and that ridiculous fob watch she’d found in a box under her bed tipped out of her bag, landing on the carpeted floor.

‘How did you get in there?’ she mumbled, picking it up and holding it in her hands. It was warm and the shape of it was reassuring, although she had no idea where she’d picked it up from or even if it was hers. She made to toss it back onto the bed but found herself putting it back in her handbag instead, forgetting it was there almost immediately. 

As she closed and locked her front door, making her way down the steps to the main road, she couldn’t shake the feeling that the date tonight would only end in heartbreak.

* * *

_ ‘Did they see you??’ _

_ She was anxious, frightened and terrified, more so than they’d ever seen her, practically throwing her friends back into the TARDIS as the ship spun widely into the time vortex, her fingers gripping the controls so tightly her hands turned white. _

_ ‘I don’t think so, Doc,’ Graham said, sharing a concerned look with the others. ‘Why? Who are they?’ _

_ ‘Bad news,’ the Doctor replied, her hands trembling, her eyes wide. ‘They’re bad news. But you’re sure? You have to be sure they didn't see you.’ _

_ ‘They didn't,’ Ryan said. ‘They couldn’t have done, we weren’t close enough. I don’t even know who you’re on about.’ _

_ ‘I didn't see them either,’ Yaz said, her heart pounding as the Doctor started rummaging through the storage boxes at the bottom of the TARDIS console, flinging things out until the floor was littered in bits of electrical equipment and an assortment of random, jumbled objects.  _

_ When she came back up again, there was a piece of twisted metal in her hands, almost like a crown, and she looked up at them with eyes so full of sorrow that Yaz just knew that whatever was coming next wasn’t going to be good. _

_ ‘I need your help with something,’ the Doctor said. ‘Something big. Because I’m in trouble, big trouble. And whatever happens next, whatever happens to me, I need you to promise me something. I know I say it all the time and completely contradict myself almost immediately but in this instance I mean it, I really do.’ _

_ ‘What?’ Graham asked, panic on his face. _

_ The Doctor looked at the three of them individually, taking in the expression on their faces before finally settling on Yaz. _

_ ‘You  _ do not interfere.’

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bet you weren't expecting another chapter so soon!
> 
> This one was basically already written, and there's a bit more story in it too :)
> 
> Thank you for all my positive comments so far! I've had this story as a draft for months and it's good to finally get it out there :D

‘Oh crap!’

Ryan quickly ducked his head down, much to the shock of his friends, before remembering that she wouldn’t recognise him anyway so it didn't make the slightest bit of difference if he hid or not. 

‘Oooh one of your exes walked in, mate?’ Doug teased him with a cheeky nudge to the arm.

‘I don’t see Natalie anywhere so that’s a relief,’ Johnny chimed in, eyes raised above the crowd to try and find the person who’d freaked Ryan. ‘That chick was mental.’

‘She’s been backpacking around Thailand for like four years now,’ Ryan said, trying not to make it obvious as he watched Jane and her friend make their way to the bar, his long lost friend’s bright face split open in a smile as she laughed at something the other woman had said. 

‘You keeping tabs on her mate?’ Doug asked, eyebrow raised.

‘Yeah, only so I know when she’s back and I know to fake my own death and run away,’ Ryan replied, shuddering.

‘This place is crowded tonight,’ Johnny complained, taking a sip of his beer, but Ryan hardly heard him, still staring at Jane.

He still wasn’t used to it. He still viewed her as the Doctor, although he knew she wasn’t, not anymore. She was an imposter to him, some strange human woman wearing his friend’s face and using her body to move around. She was still bright, still brilliant and kind and wonderful. Ryan had snuck into the back of one of the lecture halls at Sheffield University where she was giving a lecture on astrophysics as a guest lecturer. He hadn’t understood why the TARDIS had decided she should work in a secondary school rather than a university until that moment. It would have been too obvious, too easy for their enemies to find her. She’d shone and sparkled and radiated enthusiasm. Her lecture was so brilliant, so full of life and energy that Ryan actually came away from it understanding more about the galaxy.

Which, considering he travelled in it, was really something. 

She’d told them not to interfere, she’d explained that she wouldn’t really see them, that her eyes would go past them as though they weren’t there, but at the end of the lecture when she was packing up and Ryan was making his way down the steps he was  _ sure  _ she’d focused on him, just for a moment, her eyes narrowing, before going back to folding her laptop into its bag. She’d walked past Graham without even acknowledging him in the supermarket and had almost walked into Yaz on the street, but that morning, high up on the hills, she’d waved at him.

He hadn’t followed her, although the three of them regularly kept tabs on her, and had only been up there after a sleepless night with no chance of rest. He’d taken the bike too, for a laugh. He wanted to say he was getting better but he knew that was probably a lie.

She’d come hurtling past him, throwing herself up the hill so quickly he was sure she was being chased, but she’d stopped a little way above him and paused, hands on her knees, admiring the view.

Then she’d waved at him. 

‘I think that perception filter thing is wearing off,’ he’d said to Yaz on the phone when he’d gotten back to the house. ‘She looked right at me.’

_ ‘That’s good, right?’  _ Yaz’d replied.  _ ‘Maybe it means we’re almost safe?’ _

‘Yeah, maybe,’ Ryan’d said. He’d sighed, pressing his head against the doors of the TARDIS, the blue box back in their living room and blocking the view of the TV, much to Graham’s chagrin. ‘I hate this, Yaz, this normality.’

_ ‘I know what you mean,’  _ she’d replied.  _ ‘It’s amazing to think that this is what it used to be like for us, living day to day like this.’ _

‘You alright, Ryan?’ Johnny asked, waving a hand in front of his face. ‘You spaced out for a second there.’

‘Yeah, I’m good,’ Ryan said, noticing the concerned looks in his friends’ eyes. ‘Just remembering something. Anyone need another drink?’

* * *

If his friends noticed that he was subtly watching the blonde woman and her friend during the course of the evening they didn't say anything, and Ryan was easily able to keep an eye on Jane as she made her way through G&Ts like they were going out of fashion.

He hoped Jane’s tolerance to alcohol was stronger than the Doctor’s or she’d have one hell of a hangover the next day. He’d spent an amazing evening on Bellatrix Major with the Doctor, steadily getting drunker and drunker as the night went on, singing loudly to songs he didn't know the lyrics to until Graham and Yaz had dragged them away from the bar, him laughing and her giggling and tripping over her own feet.

They silently declared the hangover they had the next day  _ totally worth it.  _

A band came on later in the evening and Ryan spotted Jane up on her feet and dancing with her friend. He recognised her as Alice, the history teacher she worked with at the school. Trust her to fall for a history teacher, he had to agree it made sense. Physics and history, her two favourite things.  That was another way they were different, the dancing. Jane was more reserved, more careful with her movements whereas the Doctor flung herself body and soul into music, not caring or even noticing how flamboyant and eccentric her dancing was.

She’d taught him a move called  _ The Drunk Giraffe  _ on Bellatrix Major that she’d apparently come up. Drunk as he was, Ryan had thought it was the best thing ever 

Doug and Johnny wanted to head off around midnight to go to the Leadmill and Ryan looked urgently around for Jane, suddenly unable to see her. The bell rang for last orders, the band finished long ago, and the bar began to empty but there was no sign of her familiar blonde head. 

_ Maybe she’s gone home? _

Ryan grabbed his jacket and headed towards the door with his friends, noticing Jane had left her jacket slung over the chair. He picked it up and shrugged at his mates when they gave him weird looks.

‘I don’t think it’ll fit,’ Johnny said with a smirk.

It was cold outside, and Ryan kept his eyes peeled for his friend, but he needn’t have worried in the end as Doug soon let out a low wolf-whistle.

‘At least someone’s getting some action tonight,’ he said, wistfully.

Ryan turned to follow his gaze, only to see Jane pushed up against the wall with Alice against her, kissing as though it was just the two of them left in the world, hands roaming under clothes and tangling in each other’s hair.

‘Oh shit,’ Ryan said softly. 

He knew that Yaz liked her, it was obvious. The way she hung on her every word, the soft smiles they shared. He wouldn’t be surprised if the Doctor liked her back, god knows they shared enough secret looks that meant nothing to him or Graham.  _ This _ on the other hand, this was going to complicate things. 

They were splitting up now, Alice headed down one street with Jane going down the other, waving goodbye to each other with shit-eating grins on their faces. Jane was stumbling down the street, and Ryan turned to see the other men around them watching her. She was clearly drunk, clearly a target. 

He couldn’t have that.

‘Wait here, I’ll be right back,’ he told his mates, and then sprinted down the street after her. 

* * *

Jane felt cold, but couldn’t work out why. She hadn’t been cold earlier on, it had been warm in the bar, but now she felt the chill and she fumbled with the clasp on her purse, hoping she had enough change for a taxi. She could still feel Alice’s kiss on her lips and she smiled, although that same pang of guilt sounded deep within her like an alarm, warning her off. She could almost hear a voice calling to her, it sounded like her own voice and yet it was equally so different, soft and far away.

_ Don’t. _

Her hand hovered over the watch in her bag again, the patterns on the casing so bizarre but so familiar. Part of her wanted to open the watch, to see what was inside, but the voice inside her sounded again.

_ Not yet, it’s not safe.  _

‘Oh crap,’ she mumbled when she fumbled with her purse and it spilled onto the street, coins rolling everywhere. She bent down to pick it up and paused, suddenly realising exactly how drunk she was when her head spun and she saw double for a few moments. 

‘Don’t worry, lemme help,’ came a voice from behind her, and she looked around to see a young man holding her jacket out to her. He looked friendly enough, and she thanked him suspiciously as she took it from him, tucking it around her shoulders and watching him, ready to make a break for it if needed.

‘This isn’t enough to get you home,’ he said, looking concerned once all the coins were back in her purse.

‘S’fine,’ she shrugged. ‘I live close.’

‘You live in Park Hill, right?’ he asked, and immediately realised he’d said the wrong thing when she looked ready to bolt. 

‘No, I mean, I’m just up the road,’ he quickly backtracked. ‘You jog past my window sometimes. I saw you this morning, up on the hill? You waved at me. Lemme get you a taxi.’

‘Oh, that was you?’

‘Yeah.’ A taxi drove towards them and he held out his arm to hail it. ‘I’ve got dyspraxia, not amazing at riding a bike so I practice up there, lots of space for me to fall off.’

‘That’s… pretty cool, actually,’ she mused. ‘Good for you.’

‘Thanks.’

He held the door of the taxi open for her and Jane stumbled drunkenly in, dropping her bag on the floor again, the contents rolling everywhere.

‘Oh gosh, I’m such a clutz,’ she complained, but Ryan was already bending to pick up her things, carefully tucking them back into the bag. 

He paused when he picked up the watch, warm in his hand. This was the Doctor. This small, fragile timepiece in his hand contained his friend. She’d explained it to them as though she’d be sleeping, lying dormant inside it until the watch was opened and she woke up. He could open it right now and get his friend back. Would that be so wrong? 

_ Not yet. _

The Doctor’s voice was soft, gentle and apologetic and he rubbed his thumb over the cover, taking some solace from the feel of his friend in his mind. 

‘You need to take care of this,’ he said sadly, handing it to her. Jane looked down at the watch as though she didn't really see it and chucked it carelessly into her bag. 

Ryan handed the taxi driver a ten pound note and closed the door, but Jane opened it again seconds later. 

‘Wait, I didn't get your name?’

‘I’m Ryan,’ he said. ‘S’nice to meet you.’

‘Jane,’ she shook his hand drunkenly. ‘Thanks for looking out for me, Ryan.’

‘Always,’ Ryan said sadly, watching the taxi drive away. 

He didn't see the two shadows watching him, hissing to each other as he went back to his friends. 

* * *

That night Jane dreamt of stars.

She’d just about managed to stumble into her flat without injuring herself and had collapsed fully dressed on the bed, head swimming and limbs heavy as sleep tried to pull her under. 

She thought she’d be happy. Dates were few and far between and Alice was truly lovely. She was witty, smart, beautiful and perfect for her. She’d had a wonderful evening and, while their kiss was unexpected, it had been needed. She’d felt empty for so long, some secret part of her crying deep inside for something more and kissing Alice had, temporarily at least, squashed that feeling down. But now, lying on her bed in the darkness, only the moonlight shining through the windows, the feeling was back and it was gnawing at her insides. It wasn’t just longing this time, it was guilt. She felt guilty.

In her dreams, she was in space. There was someone with her, that nameless person who held her at night and she felt happy, happier than she’d felt for a long time. She couldn’t see the person’s face but just the knowledge that they were there was enough to comfort her. Her safe place, her anchor. 

_ ‘Do you dream?’ _

_ ‘Of course I do, everyone dreams.’ _

_ ‘What do you dream about?’ _

_ ‘All sorts of things. Custard creams, pineapples, chocolate cake.’ _

_ A laugh, bright and beautiful. ‘Why are all of those things food related?’ _

_ ‘I dream of you too, sometimes.’ _

_ ‘Really?’ A hand in hers, a soft squeeze, warmth spreading through her like fire at the contact. ‘What kind of things do you dream about me.’ _

_ ‘It might be easier if I show you.’ _

_ Soft lips melting into each other, hands cupping faces, wrapping themselves in long hair, hearts pounding against her chest. _

Jane woke up in the dark with her hands on her lips and that aching, burning sense of loss that made her sob silently into her pillow, her heart breaking, her head still blurry from the alcohol.

‘Who are you?’ she whispered silently. ‘And why did you leave me?’

The rest of her dreams were full of monsters, always a step behind her no matter how hard she ran, and she woke up in a cold sweat with that primal urge to  _ run.  _

* * *

‘I didn't even know she was into women! That’s how clueless I am. Did either of you two know?’’ Graham joked when Ryan updated them the next evening, the three of them sat in Graham’s living room with the TARDIS humming softly behind them. The Doctor had put her into low power mode but she seemed determined to get a say in their conversation and would let out the occasional beep or chirp.

Yaz broke into noisy, loud, heartbroken sobs that felt as though they were tearing her apart and Ryan immediately recognised the look on her face, he’d seen it on his own when his mum had died, on Graham’s at Grace’s funeral.

Utter despair.

‘Oh, Yaz, I wasn’t sure,’ Ryan said quietly, reaching out to take her hand gently in his and to place a reassuring arm across her back, pulling her in close against him.

‘Wait, what’s going on?’ Graham asked, confused. ‘What’s the matter, Yaz?’

‘She’s in love with the Doctor,’ Ryan said, seeing the realisation dawn on Graham’s face.

‘Oh, Yaz, love, I’m so sorry.’

Yaz shook her head, her tears giving way to noisy hiccups as Ryan gently rubbed her back in comfort. ‘It’s worse than that,’ she said quietly, fingers twisting in her t-shirt. She hadn’t wanted to say anything, didn't want their sympathy, but if this Jane/Alice thing was going to become an issue then they deserved to know about it sooner rather than later. If nothing else, at least this way they’d have a heads up when she inevitably had a meltdown.

Yaz took a deep breath. ‘I’m not just in love with her,’ she said quietly. ‘We were together.’

If Graham and Ryan were surprised, they didn't show it, and Yaz loved them for it. She suspected they’d known for a long time but preferred to let their friends come clean with their relationship without the need for guesswork or subtle hints. Not that either of them were subtle. Especially where the Doctor was concerned. She couldn’t take hints, you had to be outright with her. 

‘You kept that one quiet!’ Ryan said, nudging her gently. ‘The pair of you did. It was obvious, mind. Gotta say.’

‘It was new,’ Yaz whispered. ‘It was so new, but I was so happy. And now…’

Fresh tears spilled from her eyes and she sobbed noiselessly into Ryan’s shoulder. 

‘Hey, Yaz, it’s gonna be alright,’ Graham said, patting her knee. ‘As soon as those serpent things lose the scent we can shove that watch in her face and she’ll be back, yeah?’

‘But what about Alice?’ Yaz whispered. ‘What if the Doctor still has feelings for her?’

‘Well then I guess she’ll have a decision to make,’ Graham said, ‘But no-one holds a candle to you, Yaz. I don’t fancy Alice’s chances.’

Yaz smiled despite the tearing ache in her chest and Ryan squeezed her shoulder. 

‘Right, come on you two,’ he said. ‘Movie night in the TARDIS? I’ll get the popcorn.’

* * *

_ The Doctor was distracted, hurriedly attaching wires and connecting up cables, running around the console like a whirlwind, the TARDIS beeping in protest as it shuddered and shook through the time vortex. _

_ ‘I don’t understand,’ Graham said. ‘What are we running from?’ _

_ ‘They’re called the Lethra,’ the Doctor explained hurriedly. ‘Really, really nasty. There’s only two of them left in the whole universe so obviously I had to run into them.’ _

_ The TARDIS sped up under her hands and it sparked and fizzed, a long drawn out whine coming from the centre of it. _

_ ‘I know, I’m sorry,’ the Doctor whispered to her ship. ‘It shouldn’t be for long though.’ _

‘Why _ are we running from them?’ Yaz asked, grabbing the Doctor’s arm to get her attention. ‘If there’s only two of them then surely they won’t find us? _

_ ‘The Lethra have an  _ amazing  _ sense of smell, Yaz,’ the Doctor explained. ‘They’ve gotten a good sniff of me now and it’ll take at least five months for them to forget it. There’s only two of them left but even that is enough.’ _

_ ‘For what?’ Ryan asked. ‘What happened to the rest of them?’ _

_ ‘My people destroyed them,’ the Doctor said, her voice cold. ‘The Lethra threatened the whole cosmos, they had plans to enslave the entirety of the universe so my lot burned their planet and wiped out every last one. Apart from those two who evidently escaped.’ _

_ ‘But that’s planetary genocide,’ Yaz said, remembering the Doctor’s own words, her horror at what Tim Shaw had done. _

_ ‘Yes,’ the Doctor said, obviously having the same memory. ‘It is. My people weren’t kind, Yaz. They weren’t like me and I thank my lucky stars that none of you will ever have to see what they’re capable of.’ _

_ ‘Two people couldn’t enslave the universe though, surely?’ Graham protested. _

_ ‘They could with the TARDIS,’ the Doctor said. ‘And they’re not people, Graham. They’re monsters from the dawn of time. They look like serpents but they have arms and legs. One bite from them and you’re dead.’ _

_ She’d rigged up some kind of harness with the strange silver crown on the top of it, hovering around head height. Yaz saw the fear in the Doctor’s eyes as she looked at it. _

_ ‘I never wanted to do this again,’ she whispered, head dropping to her chest. _

_ ‘Do what again?’ Graham asked, squeezing her arm. ‘Come on, Doc, it’s alright. Just talk to us. We’ll figure this out, yeah?’ _

_ She turned her head and Yaz could see that she already had a plan, had already made up her mind about something that her friends weren’t going to like. _

_ ‘I need to turn myself human,’ she said quietly.  _

_ ‘Wait, you can do that?’ Yaz said. _

_ The Doctor nodded and pulled a fob watch out of her pocket, securing it at the front of the crown like a jewel.  _

_ ‘This is a chameleon arch. It rewrites your DNA and the original gets stored in here.’ She tapped the watch. ‘The Lethra will lose my scent after five months so all I need to do is hide myself and the TARDIS away for that time.’ _

_ ‘Well that’s not too bad,’ Ryan said, unsure. ‘You can hide in our house!’ _

_ The Doctor shook her head. ‘It’s not that simple, Ryan,’ she said. ‘The arch will rewrite every cell in my body. The TARDIS will give me a new personality, a new life on Earth. I won’t remember that I was ever a Time Lord, that I’m anything but human and, more importantly -’ she looked up at them with eyes filled with sadness. ‘I won’t remember any of you.’ _

_ ‘What? No!’ Yaz said immediately, and Graham and Ryan made their own noise of protest.  _

_ ‘You can’t forget us!’ Ryan blurted out. ‘You just can’t!’ _

_ ‘It’s only for five months,’ the Doctor said, running forward and squeezing his hands tightly. ‘Just five months, then you can shove that watch in my face and we can go back to running around the universe getting into scraps.’ _

_ ‘But surely it hurts?’ Yaz realised. ‘Rewriting your DNA, surely that’s painful?’ _

_ ‘Yes, Yaz,’ the Doctor said. ‘It is. I had to do it before, a long time ago when I was hiding from the Family of Blood and it was the most excruciating, agonising pain I’ve ever felt. I’m telling you this now, because when I turn that thing on I’m going to scream and you’re going to want to get me out of it but you  _ mustn't.’

_ ‘Doc,’ Graham said, his voice soft. ‘Do you have to?’ _

_ ‘I’m so sorry, all of you,’ the Doctor said, her voice breaking. ‘But I have to, it’s the only way. If the Lethra gets their claws on the TARDIS there won’t be a universe left to travel in.’ _

_ She hugged them all in turn and stepped into the harness, strapping the silver crown to her head.  _

_ ‘Brave hearts, all of you,’ she said softly. _

_ Then she turned it on and Graham and Ryan had to hold Yaz back once the screaming started. _

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another one! I'm really enjoying writing this! :D
> 
> I hope you're ready for a hell of a lot of Thasmin in the next chapter! 
> 
> Thank you so much for all the lovely comments ^_^ they make my day <3

_ ‘She’s only got one heart,’ Yaz whispered, cradling their unconscious friend in her arms, carefully stroking the hair away from her face, the Doctor lying pale and still, the air still heavy with the sound of her screams.  _

_ ‘She really did turn herself human,’ Graham breathed, sitting beside them and holding the Doctor’s hand, her fingers limp in his.  _

_ ‘What do we do now?’ Ryan asked. ‘Is she going to wake up and freak out cause she’s in a spaceship?’ _

_ ‘I dunno,’ Graham said. ‘She didn't really go into the specifics about what we were supposed to do next.’ _

_ ‘That’s why I’m here!’ the Doctor’s voice sounded from behind them and they spun round in shock. She was blue and almost translucent but Yaz could recognise that soft smile anywhere. This was their friend. _

_ ‘Hey! You’re a hologram!’ Ryan said excitedly. _

_ ‘Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope,’ the Doctor begged, eyes wide, hands clasped together pleadingly. ‘Good spot, Ryan! Technically I’m a voice interface, but yes you can call me a hologram.’ _

_ ‘Are you dying?’ Yaz blurted out, clutching the Doctor’s soft body closer against her own. _

_ ‘Well, we’re all dying,’ the hologram said with a shrug. ‘And I’m certainly dying quicker now that I’m human, but immediately? No, I’m not dying. I’m just asleep, all my new neural pathways are fitting themselves together, my new human memories being integrated.’ _

_ ‘It worked?’ Ryan asked. ‘You really turned yourself human.’ _

_ ‘Of course it worked,’ the Doctor said, looking offended. ‘I wouldn’t put myself through all that just for a laugh. Speaking of.’ _

_ She snapped her fingers and the physical version of the Doctor vanished, leaving Yaz with empty arms.  _

_ ‘Right, that’s me off to go be a terrible human, now it’s just you lot. First off - stop looking so worried. I’m fine, you guys are fine, we’re literally all going to be fine. Second off - wait, is that a thing people say? Second off? Maybe I should just stick with numbers like I did last time. Number three! Or two? Oh whatever, just pay attention. The TARDIS has given me a new human identity in a secondary school teaching physics. My new name is Jane Smith and I live in Flat 207, Park Hill. I’m not telling you that so you can pop in for cake every Sunday, I’m telling you so you know where I am if there’s an emergency but you  _ mustn’t  _ come and find me, d’you understand?’ _

_ ‘What if you see us?’ Yaz asked. ‘I mean you’re going to be round the corner from me, pretty much.’ _

_ ‘This is the hard bit,’ the Doctor said, kneeling on the floor next to the three of them. ‘I did this last time and it was a bit of a nightmare, a lot of things went wrong and my friend was put in danger. I can’t risk that happening to you lot so I’ve put a perception filter around you. It will only work on me. It won’t make you invisible, just un-noticeable. Now the filter won’t last forever and it will start wearing off, so by the end of the five months it’s important to stay away because I will start seeing you and I will be able to interact with you.’ _

_ ‘What do you need us to do, Doc?’ Graham asked. ‘In the five months you’re going to be human, do we need to do anything specifically?’ _

_ ‘Look after yourselves,’ the hologram said. ‘Keep an eye on me if you want, as long as you don’t jump up and down in front of my face it shouldn’t really matter. Just carry on being brilliant and wonderful and if you need me, if the Lethra find me or if there’s an emergency, open the watch and I’ll be back.’ _

_ ‘What about the TARDIS? You said they could trace that?’ Ryan asked. _

_ There was that familiar reassuring thump that indicated the TARDIS had landed and immediately the power began to slowly turn off, the Doctor’s holographic form flickering. _

_ ‘The TARDIS already has a perception filter around her but I’ve amped it up and put her in low power mode so they won’t be able to detect her.’ _

_ She flicked again and almost disappeared, Yaz reaching for her, eyes wide. _

_ ‘It’s harder to project in low power mode. Holograms drain the power quicker so I’m going to turn myself off. You’ll still be able to activate me if you need to, just say “hello, Doctor,” and I’ll appear. But only if you need to cause each time you do it’ll drain the power that much more.’ _

_ She smiled at them and even as a hologram Ryan could see the pride in her eyes. _

_ ‘You can do this,’ she said. ‘I know you can. And I just can’t wait to see you all again.’ _

_ Then she flickered out and was gone.  _

* * *

‘So! Why is the sun so hot?’

Twenty pairs of eyes stared at her, excitement on their faces. Waiting, listening, ready to understand the secrets of the universe.

‘Come on!’ Jane said with a smile, leaning against her desk. ‘Someone give it a guess. There’s no wrong answers in science.’

‘Is it because of its size, miss?’ one of the students answered and she grinned enthusiastically.

‘Yes! Gold star for you.’

‘I thought we were doing points, miss?’ another student asked and she shrugged. 

‘Whatever we’re doing, give yourself one of those. Right, so, size of the sun! The sun is made out of hydrogen and weighs a billion, billion,  _ billion  _ tons, ish, which puts immense pressure on its core because it creates massive amounts of gravity! It’s like a bicycle pump when you’re pumping your tyres up, yeah? It gets hot when you’re pumping because you’re creating pressure. The larger the pressure, the larger the temperature. So, with this in mind, what would happen if the sun was made of bananas? Would it be as hot?’ 

A smattering of laughter across the classroom as the students pictured a sun made of bananas, the warmth of said sun filtering in through the windows creating a relaxed, peaceful atmosphere. 

_ Well I’ve got a banana and in a pinch we can put up some shelves. _

The American drawl popped into her head with such violence that Jane stumbled, tripping against her desk. 

‘You alright, miss?’

‘Yeah, thanks Jamie I’m fine.’

Jane shook her head, shaking the fog from it, that somehow strange yet familiar voice sending off a chain reaction inside of her. Guilt, loss, pain, confusion.

‘You’ve gone ever such a funny colour, miss.’

‘Uh. Sorry, you lot. Funny five minutes there. Right, back to my question. A sun made of bananas, would it be as hot? Now think it through!’

She felt dizzy suddenly, hot and blurry-eyed, spots of light beginning to appear in her vision. Her fingers gripped the desk she was leaning on, trying to ignore the spinning in her mind. 

‘Yes, it would!’ came a voice from the front, and she looked down to see Martha with her hand in the air, an excited smile on her face.

_ He is just everything to me and he doesn’t even look at me but I don’t care. Cause I love him to bits. _

‘It’s because of the size! Isn’t it, miss? Because a billion billion billion tons of bananas would still be as heavy as the sun and would produce massive amounts of gravity which would produce massive amounts of heat!’

Everything suddenly felt disconnected and confused, there was an alarm going off in her head, some sort of warning but she didn't understand  _ why.  _

‘But it wouldn’t burn because there’s no hydrogen in bananas, so you’d get one massive burst of heat but then the reaction would die. Is that right, miss?’ That was from Clara near the back of the room, her blonde pigtails swinging as she worked out the puzzle, a triumphant grin on her face.

Clara was a teacher too, wasn’t she?

‘Miss? Are you okay? Do you need us to call someone?’

_ This is as brave as I know how to be. _

‘Miss? Do you need to sit down?’

Her head spun and burned, she could see stars in her vision and her limbs felt heavy, panic rising up inside of her, the alarm ringing in her ears getting louder and louder, screaming for her attention. Something was coming, something dangerous and they were in trouble, her friends were in trouble, she had to rescue them she had to… had to…

‘Miss!’

Then there was blackness.

* * *

On the other side of the city, Graham got a fright when the TARDIS began to alarm and he dropped his tea.

* * *

‘And that’s why smoking weed is a really bad idea,’ Yaz finished, the assembly hall full of students now thoroughly bored and half asleep. She couldn’t find it in herself to care particularly, she could give them a lecture as much as she wanted but from experience it didn't matter, they were going to do it anyway. 

It also didn't help that Alice was stood at the back of the room, smiling encouragingly at her with the other teachers. It  _ really  _ didn't help that she was so kind and lovely, it would have been easier if she was some horrible old bag.

But then the Doctor was only ever attracted to those who were completely brilliant, wasn’t she?

‘Thank you so much for that thoroughly informative talk, PC Khan,’ the headmistress said, leading the students into a half-hearted round of applause. ‘I hope you all had your thinking caps on today and you all listened and took in what PC Khan was saying.’

PC Khan really doubted that was the case.

She zoned out a little as the headmistress drew the assembly to a close, leaning against the wall staring at her boots, trying to avoid looking at Alice. What would the history teacher think if she knew that her girlfriend was actually an alien from another planet and her competition was in the room at that moment?

What would the Doctor think if she knew what Yaz was feeling right now?

‘Is everything alright, Mrs Evercott?’ the headmistress asked suddenly and Yaz looked up to see a little commotion going on at the back of the room, a woman who must be Mrs Evercott speaking urgently to Alice.

‘Yes, everything’s fine,’ the woman said. ‘I just need to borrow Alice and her first aid skills for a few moments, one of our staff is feeling poorly.’

Yaz felt a weird feeling come over her. Call it intuition, call it a sixth sense, but she had a sudden feeling that the staff member they were referring to was Jane. She quickly followed them out of the assembly hall, almost tripping over her own feet in an attempt to catch up as she called after them.

‘I have first aid training too, maybe I’ll be able to help.’

‘That’s very good of you, PC Khan,’ Alice said and  _ urgh  _ Yaz just wanted to punch her in her perfect, lovely face. ‘Which teacher is it?’

‘Well, it’s Jane,’ Mrs Evercott said as they hurried through the corridors. ‘The students said she suddenly went over all pale and collapsed.’

Jane was sat on the floor in the classroom when the three of them burst in, a glass of water in her hand and a throng of worried students around her. She looked annoyed and tried to protest that she was fine and had just felt a bit hot for a moment when Mrs Evercott and Alice started fussing over her.

She caught Yaz’s eye and frowned, eyes narrowing for a moment and Yaz felt her heart flip in her chest. She shouldn’t be able to see her, she shouldn’t really notice that Yaz was even there. 

A perception filter, that’s what she’d called it. It didn't make you invisible, just difficult to notice. Like the watch which contained her Time Lord counterpart. But then she had seen Ryan up on the hill, and again outside the bar. The filter must be finally starting to wear off.

Jane looked confused and uneasy and that, coupled with the tender hand Alice had on her knee, made Yaz want to run forward to comfort her and hold her in her arms the way she knew the Doctor loved.

Except this wasn’t the Doctor, and she couldn’t.

‘Is fainting an arrestable offence, officer?’ Jane joked and Yaz cracked a smile despite herself. Terrible jokes was a very Doctor thing to do, even if Jane didn't realise it. The realisation that this was the first sentence her friend had directed at her in almost five months set off a cacophony of emotions inside Yaz and she felt a surge of happiness at the knowledge that they were  _ almost there.  _

‘Oh you know, I was just in the neighbourhood and my  _ probably skipped breakfast this morning  _ alarm went off,’ Yaz said. ‘Thought I’d pop by to offer some custard creams.’

‘Did you really skip breakfast, miss?’ one of the students asked. ‘My mum says it’s the most important meal of the day.’

‘Wise woman, your mum,’ Jane responded, looking guilty. ‘We’d all be wise to follow her advice.’ 

Yaz pulled a packet of custard creams out of her pocket and handed them over. Carrying biscuits around while on shift was always a good idea. Break times, if you got them at all, were few and far between and Yaz had a newfound appreciation for Graham and his pocket sandwiches. 

‘Ooh my favourite!’

_ Ha. Take that, Alice. _

Her phone rang and Yaz quickly excused herself, standing in the corridor and checking the caller ID. Graham. As soon as she accepted the call her ears were assaulted by a cacophony of sounds, ringing, alarms, high pitched whining and, above it all, Ryan’s voice in the background yelling  _ turn it off.  _

‘What on  _ earth…?’ _

_ ‘It’s the TARDIS! She won’t shut up!’  _ Graham yelled above the din.  _ ‘She’s been going for about five minutes now! Are you still at the school? Is the Doc okay?’ _

Yaz peered her head around the classroom door were Jane was being helped to her feet, brushing biscuit crumbs off her trousers. 

‘Yeah. She just fainted, actually, but she’s okay.’

_ ‘You think the two are connected?’  _ Ryan’s voice again.

_ ‘They gotta be!’  _ Graham yelled.  _ ‘Do you reckon the noise means -’ _

He lowered his voice suddenly when the sounds abruptly stopped and he realised he was screaming down the phone at Yaz. 

_ ‘Well that’s better,’  _ Ryan muttered. 

_ ‘Do you reckon the noise means they’re here? Those Lethra the Doc was on about?’  _ Graham asked, voice back to a reasonable level.

‘I dunno,’ Yaz said, watching as Jane was handed her coat and bag, still protesting, Mrs Evercott and Alice insisting that she take the rest of the afternoon off and practically marching her out of the classroom. ‘What’s the TARDIS saying now?’

_ ‘She’s gone quiet,’  _ Ryan said.  _ ‘What do we do?’ _

‘I’m going to keep on eye on Jane,’ Yaz said. ‘Lemme know if the TARDIS does anything else, yeah?’

_ ‘You got it. I’ll fire up the hologram, see what she says.’ _

Yaz hung up and took a deep breath. The Doctor hadn’t wanted them to interfere, but she also hadn’t warned them that even as a human she was still telepathically linked to the TARDIS. There was only a week and a half left and if the Lethra had managed to track them to Earth they’d be upping their game, determined to follow the scent until their trail went cold and they had no choice but to leave.

Yaz straightened her uniform and headed off in search of Jane.

* * *

After being sent home in the middle of her lesson, a phenomenon which had never happened in all of Jane’s years of teaching, she found herself in one of the little coffee shops opposite the school, doodling on the back of a napkin as she sipped her latte, her head still muddled but the fog slowly starting to lift. She was forever drawing on things, trying to recreate the monsters from her dreams. On this occasion, she was drawing what looked like a gigantic pepperpot with a sink plunger and an egg whisk and she sighed and crumbled the napkin in her hand, moodily taking another sip of her coffee and trying not to think about the police officer who she suddenly wasn’t able to get out of her head.

There was something about her, something so  _ achingly  _ familiar that was giving her butterflies in her stomach, her heart still beating quickly at the thought of her. Even with Alice in front of her, the woman she’d literally made out with against the wall like a horny teenager, she still hadn’t been able to take her eyes off the officer. She felt as though she knew this woman so well while equally not knowing her at all. What even was that?

The mysterious woman in her dreams floated to her mind and Jane dropped her head to the table, muttering about being a  _ useless lesbian. _

‘Who’s a useless lesbian?’

Jane looked up and flushed pink, the police officer from earlier in front of her with a drink in her hand. She’d changed into dark skinny jeans and a jumper embroidered with stars and looked nervous, tucking her hair behind her ear. 

‘Me,’ Jane said with a shrug and a smile. 

‘Preaching to the choir there,’ the officer said. ‘Is it okay if I join you? I was coming in to get a coffee anyway and spotted you sitting by yourself. I wanted to make sure you were alright, you looked ever so pale earlier.’

‘Absolutely,’ Jane said, her smile wide, the weirdest sensation of happiness swelling up inside her. She didn't realise it was possible to experience  _ confused  _ happiness, but clearly it was.

‘I’m Jane, nice to meet you.’

‘And you,’ the officer said, her eyes sparkling. ‘I’m Yaz.’ 

* * *

‘Hello, Doctor,’ Graham called into the empty air of the TARDIS, and the hologram flickered to life with a bright smile.

‘Hello, Graham! Hello Ryan!’ she said cheerily. ‘I estimate it’s been roughly 4 and a half months since we spoke last.’

‘It has, we’re nearly there, Doc, but the TARDIS did something weird today,’ Graham said.

‘Did she? Hold on a mo.’

The hologram froze, as though she was glitching, and Ryan spotted numbers flashing in front of the Doctor’s eyes.

‘Ooh okay, not good news,’ she said once she’d unfrozen.

‘What’s wrong?’ Ryan asked. ‘Is everything alright?’

‘Probably, difficult to say. The Lethra have found us.’

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So in the story 'The Secret in Vault 13' the Doctor gives Ryan a little holographic version of herself in a disk and it activates if you say 'okay, Doctor' so I just stole that and ran with it cause she's basically Google.
> 
> Also I am really not that great at physics but the banana thing is true, I googled it :)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter four! 
> 
> We're still on track to get this story all finished in 2 more chapters and in the next one there's going to be some action! :D
> 
> THANK YOU FOR ALL THE COMMENTS MY HEART CAN'T TAKE HOW NICE EVERYONE IS
> 
> HAVE SOME THASMIN TO SAY THANK YOU.
> 
> I mean it's Jane/Yaz but still counts, right?

When Jane woke up the next morning she was once again filled with that deep-seated, primal urge to  _ run.  _

She’d had weird dreams of snakes and lizards chasing her and a blue box that flew through time and space. She’d dreamt of Yaz and Ryan and someone else that she couldn’t see or put a name to. She’d felt fear and pain and then that wonderful sensation of being held, of being loved, someone cradling her in their arms. Except this time, and she knew it made absolutely no sense considering they’d only met the day before, she knew it to be Yaz. 

She’d spent a wonderful afternoon with her, talking and laughing in the coffee shop until time slipped away from both of them. In a weird way it was as though she knew Yaz, as though she’d known her longer than the few hours they’d spent together. There was something about her, something bright that burned like the sun. She was amazing, incredible, and all thoughts of Alice had been pushed completely out of her mind. 

The sky outside was bright despite the early hour and Jane found herself jogging back up towards the hills, the wind light and refreshing against her skin. She didn't seem to feel the cold and was perfectly happy in her tank top and shorts, the other runners in their leggings and jackets giving her odd looks.

It was quiet on the hill and peaceful and Jane sat for a moment, allowing the beating of her heart to slow, taking in deep lungfuls of the fresh air, a blissful smile on her face as she watched the sun climb higher into the sky. She’d swapped phone numbers with Yaz the day before and she pulled her phone from her pocket just so she could look at the number in her phone, 11 digits packed full of possibilities. She felt like a teenage girl with a crush, unsure of what to do, how to proceed.  _ Do I text her first or does she text me first? If I text first am I too keen? If I don’t am I not keen enough? How many ‘x’s should I type, if any? And what about Alice? _

A  _ crash  _ and muffled swearing interrupted her stressful monologue and she looked down to see Ryan below her, angrily kicking his bike out from under him, standing up with muddy patches on his jeans. He didn't seem to have noticed her and she carefully made her way back down the hill as he sat against the grass, wiping away angry tears from his cheeks. 

‘You alright?’ she called when she was close enough and he looked up at her in surprise.

‘Yeah, just - well, you know.’

‘I think it shows more about your character that you’re so determined to do it than it does that you haven’t managed it yet,’ she said, sitting beside him. She felt comfortable with Ryan, despite only having met him a couple of times, as though she could trust him implicitly. 

‘That’s… a really nice thing to say, actually,’ Ryan said after a moment’s pause.

She shrugged, stretching her legs out in front of her. ‘We can’t be good at everything, can we?’ she asked. ‘But the determination to learn a new skill, especially something you know you’ll struggle with, says a lot.’

‘How did you get to be so nice?’ Ryan asked with a sigh, kicking mud off the bottom of his shoes.

‘You should see me when I’m tired,’ Jane said. ‘I’m not so nice then.’

Ryan, who had seen the Doctor when she was tired and completely agreed with her statement, decided it was better to say nothing. 

‘I wanted to say thank you, as well,’ Jane said. ‘You know, for the other night.’

‘It was nothing,’ Ryan said, shrugging it off with a wave of his hand. ‘Just wanted to make sure you got home okay. How was your head the next morning?’

‘Urgh, don’t,’ Jane moaned. ‘I tell you what I was grateful it was a Saturday, I couldn’t get out of bed all day!’

‘Bit of a lightweight, are you?’ Ryan teased.

‘So are you!’ she protested, and then froze. ‘Sorry,’ she said after a moment’s hesitation. ‘I don’t know why I said that.’

_ Okay, so this is called the Drunk Giraffe.  _

_ The what? _

_ You’ll see what I mean. You gotta own it, Ryan. ‘kay? Become the Drunk Giraffe, unleash your inner Drunk Giraffe. _

_ Please stop saying Drunk Giraffe. _

‘You’re not wrong,’ Ryan said with a guilty smile, the memory still fresh in his mind. ‘I really am. I get convinced to do all kinds of funky dance moves. S’embarrassing.’

Jane’s phone pinged and her heart pounded with excitement. Was it Yaz? She tugged it out of the pocket of her shorts. It was a text from Alice.

_ Hey, you in?  _

‘Oh shit,’ she mumbled, quickly firing back a response.

‘Everything alright?’ Ryan asked casually, sneakily side-eyeing her screen to see what she was typing.

_ Sorry, totally forgot and went for a run! :( _

‘Yeah, I was meant to meet up with someone this morning for coffee but I forgot,’ she said, putting the phone back in her pocket after receiving a  _ no worries  _ response from Alice. Nothing else, just those two words. Oh dear. 

‘That’s okay, happens,’ Ryan said, noticing her downtrodden face. ‘You can just reschedule, right?’

‘Yeah, I guess so,’ Jane said, tugging out clumps of grass absentmindedly. ‘Can I ask you something, Ryan? Cause you seem to be a man of the world.’

‘That’s a fairly accurate description of me, yeah.’

‘How do you know if you fancy someone? Like if you go on a date with them and it goes really well but you’re not sure if you  _ like  _ like them or not?’

The question threw Ryan, but given the fact he’d just blatantly been spying on her private conversation he understood the context. 

‘I always find that if you  _ like  _ like someone, you think about them all the time. No matter what you’re doing they’ll just pop into your head. Like if you’re chopping onions or washing your hands or going for a walk. They’ll just be there,’ he replied, watching Jane’s face cautiously. ‘Does that help?’

‘Yeah,’ she mumbled. ‘It does.’

She stood up and stretched, silhouetted against the rising sun, the light catching her hair and making it glow golden for a moment. 

‘Well, this is going to be a fun conversation,’ she said, shoulders slumped.

‘The best you can do is be honest,’ Ryan said. ‘If it ain’t working it ain’t working, don’t drag it along in the hopes that it will.’

She smiled at him, and the smile was so like the Doctor that Ryan felt a pang deep in his chest. 

‘Thanks, Ryan. That really helped. And thanks again for the other night, really. I appreciate it a lot.’

‘Have an amazing day,’ he told her. ‘And good luck!’

His phone rang as she jogged back down the hill and he was glad to see it was Yaz calling. While he knew he shouldn’t be happy at the news of Alice and Jane’s soon to be imploding relationship, at least it might give Yaz some comfort that she wouldn’t have competition for the Doctor’s affections when she was back to being a Time Lord again.

‘Hiya, Yaz! You’ll never guess who I just -’

_ ‘We’ve got a problem,’  _ she blurted out, and he recognized that tone anywhere. That was Yaz’s ‘I’m trying not to panic but I am actually kind of panicking’ voice.

‘Everything alright?’ 

_ ‘Remember what the Doctor said? About the Lethra resembling snakes and being able to kill you with one bite?’ _

‘Yeah…’ he replied, already gathering up his bike and slipping and sliding back down the hill.

_ ‘This isn’t public knowledge yet but we found a body this morning outside the Park Hill flats, literally round the corner from me. The police are treating it like a homicide but I don’t think it is, Ryan.’ _

‘Why?’

_ ‘Because they’ve got two huge puncture marks on their leg. Like they’ve been bitten by one massive snake.’  _

* * *

‘Don’t forget homework for tomorrow!’ Jane called as the bell rang for morning break, her students starting to pack up their things. ‘I want 300 words on what you would do if you could travel through time. Be as imaginative as you like! Ooh and draw me some pictures, I love pictures.’

Once the classroom was empty, Jane slumped back in her chair, powering up her laptop and flicking through her emails. The sun was shining outside but it didn't reflect her mood and the knock that sounded on her door didn't help either. 

‘So, you’re avoiding me,’ Alice said, leaning against the doorframe.

‘Yeah, I am,’ Jane replied with a sigh, closing the laptop lid and standing up to face her. 

‘Come on then, spit it out,’ Alice said, closing the classroom door and giving her a small smile. ‘I think I know what’s coming, but you need to say it out loud.’

‘I just…’ Jane looked down at her feet, running her fingers through her short hair. She knew what needed to be said but actually  _ saying  _ it was so difficult, the thought of hurting another person seemed impossible to her. And yet, not saying it now would only hurt her more in the future.

‘I - I don’t think this is going to go anywhere,’ Jane said, forcing herself to meet Alice’s eyes. ‘I don’t think my feelings for you are that strong.’

If Alice was upset, she didn't show it and she took Jane’s hands instead and squeezed them lightly. 

‘It’s okay,’ she said gently. ‘Really. I’d rather know now. Besides, we only went on one date. It’s not like we’re moving in together.’

‘Thank you,’ Jane said softly. ‘Thank you for understanding.’

‘Of course.’

The bell rang again, the school beginning to fill back up with students ready for the final lessons before lunch. 

‘I guess I’ll see you at lunch,’ Alice said, opening the classroom door and smiling at her. ‘We’re on playground duty.’

_ ‘Again?’ _

‘Not to worry, I’ve got snacks.’

_ Your pockets are just full of snacks aren’t they? _

The voice snuck into her head just as Alice left the room and Jane stood there, dazed, trying to figure out why she was hallucinating Yaz’s voice in her head all of a sudden. She was sure that conversation had never taken place, they certainly hadn’t talked about the contents of her pockets during their impromptu coffee session the day before. And yet, at the same time, she was sure she hadn’t just made it up. 

She went back to her desk feeling uneasy and with the weirdest sensation that someone was watching her. 

* * *

‘Hello, Doctor.’

‘Yaz!’

The hologram smiled brightly at the three of them, the TARDIS lights dimming a little more. 

‘Uh-oh, looks like we’re draining the last of the power. Better be quick. How can I help you?’

‘I stole this from evidence,’ Yaz said, holding out a small vial filled with a thick, gloopy green liquid. ‘Someone was murdered this morning and there were puncture marks in their leg, like a snake bite. This was around the wound. I need to get this back quickly before anyone notices I’ve taken it and toxicology will take another few hours to get back so we need to know if this is the Lethra.’

‘Please insert it into the console here,’ the hologram said, gesturing towards the TARDIS’s analysis panel where there was a glass beaker for Yaz to put the vial into. The console began to flash when the sample was accepted and the hologram froze again as she considered the data, and when she un-froze her expression was grave.

‘It is definitely the Lethra,’ she replied. ‘Lethra venom, no mistaking it. One of the most corrosive substances in the galaxy. How far away was the body found?’

‘Not far at all,’ Ryan said. ‘Literally just outside your flat. Or, the human you’s flat.’

‘If they knew where I was they would have found me already,’ the hologram said, considering. ‘I think they’re just sniffing around, trying their luck. We should be safe for the time being. But if you’re not watching me I think you’d better start. Don’t engage with them, I can’t let anything happen to you on my account.’

The hologram flickered off and came back on again three long seconds later. 

‘That’s it for the power,’ she said. ‘The TARDIS hasn’t got enough left to project me in low power mode. Stay out of the way, be careful, and if you think you’re in danger open the watch. Do  _ not  _ engage and don’t -’

Then she turned off and didn't come back on again.

‘Shit,’ Ryan said quietly. 

‘I need to get this back,’ Yaz said, snatching the vial out of the console. ‘I’m free this evening, I’ll hang outside her flat, keep an eye on things. You two watch the TARDIS, let me know if you get into trouble.’

‘You too,’ Graham said. ‘And you heard what hologram-Doc said, don’t engage. Call us if you need back up.’

‘Or the police,’ Ryan said quickly. ‘You know, if it’s really bad.’ 

* * *

That evening found Yaz back to following Jane around Sheffield after she’d finished work at the school. Fortunately she didn't go for another run. As fit as Yaz was Jane was on a whole other level and she wasn’t sure she’d have been able to keep up.

Yaz waited in her car, watching as Jane made her way up to her flat with a bag of groceries tucked under her arm. It had been a warm day and the air was cooler now, the stars coming out to shine above their heads. She watched Jane dig her keys out of her bag to unlock the door, stepping inside and closing it behind her, the lights flickering on in the windows. 

Yaz dug a book out of her bag and settled back, glad she still hadn’t completely reverted back from night shifts a few weeks prior.

That being said, she was on the verge of dropping off when she heard the  _ chink  _ of a glass bottle hit the ground and saw moving, something scuttling in the dark, a blurry shape making its way across one of the levels, approaching Jane’s flat…

Yaz threw herself out of the car and legged it for the stairs, hurling herself up them two at a time, heart pounding in her chest, panic filling her. 

The shape was gone once she’d made it to the right floor and she pounded on Jane’s door, hands rummaging in her pockets for something to use as a weapon if it came to that.

‘Hiya, Yaz!’ Jane said, pleasantly surprised when she opened the door. ‘You alright? You been running or something?’

Yaz realised she probably looked a state. Her hair was a mess, her cheeks were pink from running and she was having difficulty catching her breath.

‘Yeah, fine,’ she wheezed. ‘Everything okay? I was in the area, thought I saw someone up here following you?’

‘Oh no, just my neighbour,’ Jane said. ‘I collected a parcel for him this morning. Bless you for making sure I was alright though. Want a drink? You look like you could do with one.’

Yaz knew she shouldn’t, Yaz knew it was a terrible idea. Her brain was telling her no but by god was her heart telling her  _ yes.  _

Jane poured her a glass of lemonade and gestured for her to join her on the sofa. She had something playing on the TV but it was paused and she smiled at Yaz, absentmindedly playing with a strand of her blonde hair while Yaz got her breath back.

‘Thanks,’ Yaz said when she’d finished the glass. ‘That was really needed.’

‘No problem, want another?’

Yaz shook her head. Now she was in Jane’s flat she had a chance to look around. She wasn’t sure how the TARDIS had organised this for her. That was something the Doctor had been clear on; the TARDIS would create her a new identity and her fam wouldn’t have to do anything aside from keeping an eye on her. And making sure she didn't eat pears, she’d been  _ extremely  _ clear on that. No pears. 

‘You’ve got a lovely place,’ Yaz said, admiring her living room.

There were books lining every available inch of the bookcase from Shakespeare to Tolkien with all manner of genres in-between. There was maps on the wall and small trinkets scattered about the place on various shelves. Science books took up three rows of space and there was a telescope in the corner of the room pointed up towards the sky, a astrology chart lying next to it. 

‘Do you travel?’ Yaz asked, admiring the maps.

‘Oh no, always wanted to though,’ Jane said. ‘I just like seeing how other places are laid out, all the history in their buildings and structures. Maybe one day I’ll actually get to go.’

‘I’m positive you will,’ Yaz said, smiling at her. 

Jane smiled back and for the first time it really hit Yaz how  _ completely  _ like the Doctor she looked. Of course she  _ was  _ the Doctor, but her personality was so different that she felt and sounded like another person and when she smiled  _ that  _ smile, the one that Yaz had seen hundreds of times on the Doctor’s face, Yaz felt suddenly like she may start crying.

‘How about you?’ Jane asked. ‘Have you travelled?’

‘Oh yeah,’ Yaz said. ‘I’ve been all over the place. The stuff I’ve seen, I couldn’t begin to tell you if I tried.’

‘Oh yeah? Try me,’ Jane said. ‘I’d love to hear it.’

For the first time, Yaz realised Jane was in her pyjamas with a dressing gown tied loosely around her waist and she stood up hurriedly, almost knocking the coffee table over. 

‘I’m so sorry,’ Yaz stammered. ‘I didn't realise you were going to bed, I should leave you alone now.’

‘You don’t have to,’ Jane protested, face falling. ‘You’re welcome to stay a bit longer. I always put my jammies on early, probably won’t go to bed for another couple of hours though. And I’d love to hear about your adventures.’

_ Go home. Go home. Go home. This is a terrible idea you really need to go home. _

_ But on the other hand, this is the perfect way to keep an eye on her.  _

Yaz sat down again and smiled. 

* * *

Keeping the more unbelievable parts of their adventures out of her story was extremely difficult and Yaz found herself constantly tripping over her words in an effort to correct herself but Jane didn't seem to mind. She sat smiling at Yaz, her head resting in her hand, lapping up every story Yaz had to tell her.

‘Really? Your friend got thrown in the lake?’

‘Yeah!’ Yaz said. ‘Luckily she’s a really good swimmer. Had a terrible cold when we got home though, she fell in it twice!’

‘She sounds very clumsy,’ Jane said.

‘Oh she is,’ Yaz said. ‘Constantly walking into things, she’s a right calamity.’

‘A Calamity Jane, even?’ Jane said, laughing. ‘I’m the same. I trip over over my feet just making a cup of tea.’ 

Yaz had seen her do just that. 

It was much later and Yaz had been talking for a few hours now with Jane staring enraptured at her. Yaz felt so much more comfortable now and if she concentrated really hard she could pretend that she was having a conversation with her girlfriend on the purple sofa in the TARDIS, rather than someone who was practically a stranger to her, despite their similarities. 

‘Sorry, I’m being rude!’ Yaz said. ‘I’ve been sat here talking and you’ve not had a chance to say anything! Tell me about yourself.’

‘Not much to tell, really,’ Jane said. ‘Wanted to be an astronaut when I was younger but that didn't really work out so now I teach physics instead. Equally as rewarding.’

‘And your family?’

‘Oh. I’m an orphan, I lost my parents when I was very young, grew up in a children’s home in South Yorkshire.’ 

The way she said it was robotic, almost rehearsed. It sounded more like an automatic response than a sincere answer to her question. 

‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Yaz said, quietly.

‘Don’t be,’ Jane said. ‘I don’t remember them. And it wasn’t so bad, I had science to keep me company.’

‘When did you realise you wanted to be a teacher?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Jane said, frowning, her eyes glazing a little. ‘I guess I just always fancied it. Teaching others about the universe, where they came from, how we’ve changed and where we’re going. It’s a privilege, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah,’ Yaz said with a smile. ‘It really is.’

‘How about you? When did you realise you wanted to be a police officer?’

‘I just wanted to help people,’ Yaz said. ‘And I guess I wanted to prove to myself that I was worth more than what some people think of me.’

‘How could anyone not see you as brilliant?’ Jane said, softly. ‘You’re like Sirius, you’re the brightest star in the galaxy. Well, this galaxy anyway!’

Yaz knew that star well, the Doctor had taken her to see it and had said exactly the same thing.

‘Actually,’ Jane said, jumping up excitedly. ‘I can show you!’

She led Yaz over to the telescope and quickly checked its position before gesturing for Yaz to look through it, sitting her down on the small sofa set up in front of it and joining her. 

The night sky was dark but the stars were beautiful and Yaz felt her heart beating quickly at the feel of Jane’s hand on her back as she guided her to look in the right direction. She was sat close beside her and Yaz felt her heart flip as she inhaled the soft scent of her shampoo. 

‘Do you see those three stars close together? In a straight line?’

‘Orion’s Belt,’ Yaz said softly. 

‘Yes! Now look to the left a little, you’ll see a bright, shining star. That’s Sirius, or the Dog Star.’

‘I see it.’

It was impossible to miss. The telescope was an excellent quality and Sirius was glowing in the sky, burning bright, almost blue and shining with starlight. It was nothing compared to seeing it with her own eyes, and yet the moment was heavy with anticipation and it felt equally as amazing as when the Doctor herself had flung wide the TARDIS doors, turning the lights off to allow the full force of the star to illuminate the console room. 

‘It’s beautiful,’ Yaz breathed. 

‘Actually, I think you might be able to see…’

Jane’s hands were on Yaz’s then as she carefully maneuvered the telescope a little bit down and to the right, her skin soft and warm. 

‘Do you see that?’ she asked, almost whispering. ‘Another bright star, glowing red?’

‘Is that Mercury?’

‘Yes.’

_ Home of the Mercurian energy beasts,  _ Yaz thought to herself, remembering the story the Doctor had told her about the time she’d visited as a man with two friends of hers. Apparently, despite the name, the energy beasts were helpful and peaceful and had welcomed travellers to their world. 

‘Don’t you wish you could be up there? Exploring the universe?’ Jane said wistfully. ‘Can you even imagine how amazing that would be?’

_ More than you know.  _

It was then they realised that as they’d been sat together contemplating the mysteries of the cosmos, they’d also shuffled closer to each other and in the stillness and quiet that followed Yaz realised that she was staring at Jane’s lips, her face only inches away from hers. 

Jane obviously had just realised this too as she suddenly went very quiet and for a few moments it was just Yaz and Jane staring at each other’s mouths and trying to breathe as normally as possible.

_ One normal night. _

Yaz initiated it. How could she not? Her girlfriend, even if she didn't know it yet, was only inches away from her and the smell of Jane was drifting up Yaz’s nostrils and making her head feel fuzzy. She smelt exactly like the Doctor did, even that faint undernote of engine oil was there and Yaz didn't want to say no anymore. 

Kissing Jane was as easy as breathing, She was reassuring and warm and safe and  _ so _ familiar. Yaz’s mind was flooded with memories of kissing the Doctor. Quick pecks in the TARDIS control room, long lingering kisses in bed, soft and gentle on some new planet when Graham and Ryan had inevitably fallen behind. Yaz was so ready for more, so desperate for more from the Doctor that she realised she was kissing Jane too hard and she pulled back, breathless.

‘I’m sorry,’ Yaz said quietly. ‘I just… I’ve wanted to do that for a while.’

‘That’s alright,’ Jane said, her smile brilliant and beautiful, eyes soft and pupils large and dark. ‘I liked it. Wanna do it again?’

She didn't need to ask a second time before their lips met again and Yaz’s hands were in Jane’s hair and Jane had her tongue in her mouth and coherent thought just floated away. Hands roamed under Yaz’s shirt and Yaz broke away from her mouth to bite gently at her neck, Jane gasping that soft moan that Yaz knew all too well. 

_ I shouldn’t be doing this. _

Jane’s hands were sliding up towards Yaz’s breasts under the soft fabric of her t-shirt and Yaz was fiddling with the buttons on Jane’s pyjama top, when she suddenly realised what she was doing and she pulled away, flushed and embarrassed.

‘We can’t do this,’ she stammered.

‘It’s okay,’ Jane said, softly. ‘I want to.’

‘No, I mean…’

What did she mean? What did she want to say? We’ve kissed before but never gone all the way? The closest I came to a grope was the side of the Doctor’s breast when she was pressed up against Yaz’s bedroom door one morning? I want this  _ so badly  _ but I want it with the Doctor, not with you?

_ I’m probably just your rebound. _

Ryan had told her about their conversation on the hill that morning and Yaz had seen Alice and Jane leaving the school with sad smiles before splitting up and heading in different directions. She’d hated herself for the pang of happiness she’d felt in her chest when she realised they were no longer together. 

‘It’s just, this just feels too fast, that’s all. It’s not that I don’t want to!’ Yaz said quickly. ‘I just…’

_ I just? _

‘Hey, that’s totally cool, don’t even worry about it,’ Jane said, smiling, looking so much like the Doctor that Yaz wanted to cling to her and not ever let go. Her hair was ruffled from where Yaz had been running her hands through it and her lips were swollen, a small hickey beginning to form on her neck.

She was so beautiful that Yaz couldn’t stand it.

‘I should go,’ Yaz said, making to stand up.

‘What? Don’t be daft, it’s one in the morning!’ Jane exclaimed.

Yaz noted that she hadn’t needed to look at a clock to see what the time was, she’d just immediately known. She wondered if Jane had realised she’d done that too.

‘Look, stay with me, in my bed, and I promise I’ll keep my hands to myself and we won’t even cuddle if you don’t want to,’ Jane said, raising one hand in the air. ‘Scout’s honour. Or, if you’re uncomfortable, I’ll kip on the sofa, whatever you want to do is totally fine with me.’

Yaz’s mind was already made up and she didn't think she’d be able to tear herself away even if she really wanted to. 

_ Come on universe, give me this. Give me this one normal night with my girlfriend. _

‘Do not deny me cuddles,’ Yaz said, standing up and taking Jane’s hand, pulling her up with her.

Jane’s room was down the hall and the blonde woman found her a spare pair of pyjamas, giving her some space to change as she went into the bathroom to brush her teeth.

Jane’s room was sparser than her living room and the only decoration was a couple of glow in the dark stars that were stuck randomly on the ceiling and a stellar map of the moon’s constellations on the wall. Yaz smiled at the faintly glowing stars above her head as she clambered under the duvet and curled up, pressing her face into Jane’s pillow, breathing in that familiar, reassuring scent. 

Jane came in a few moments later and got under the duvet with her, turning her light off and gathering Yaz in her arms, pulling the sheets over their heads.

Yaz closed her eyes. Like this, in the dark with Jane in her arms, she could pretend that she was in the TARDIS and she’d woken up in the middle of the night and the Doctor was holding her, maybe stroking her hair or planting light kisses to her temple.

‘Is this okay?’ Jane asked.

With her head pressed against Jane’s chest, Yaz could hear the single, solitary beat of her heart. It frightened her. She wondered where the Doctor’s other heart was, if it was still in her chest but wasn’t beating or if the chameleon arch had completely removed it. She moved away so she couldn’t hear it anymore, resting her head on Jane’s arm instead.

‘Yes, this is perfect,’ she said softly, wrapping an arm around Jane’s waist.

‘Cuddles with Yaz? Amazing.’

_ Okay, that hurt. _

‘Sweet dreams, Yaz.’

‘You two, Doc - Jane.’

* * *

‘Uh, grandad?’

Ryan paused in wheeling his bike out of the house. It was early morning and the sun was only just beginning its ascent into the sky but there was something green and gooey on the pavement in front of him that was calling his attention.

‘Everything alright?’

Graham came down the stairs to join Ryan in the doorway and immediately spotted what he did, freezing as they contemplated the splatter outside the front of their house.

‘What the hell is that thing?’ Ryan asked. 

‘I dunno,’ Graham said. ‘It wasn’t there last night though. It looks like a blob of jelly or something.’

‘I thought that too,’ Ryan said. ‘But look at the pavement.’

Graham knelt down to observe it carefully and his heart plummeted into his stomach.

‘Has it…?’

‘Yep,’ Ryan said. ‘It’s eroded the concrete.’

‘That’s not human.’

‘No, I don’t think it is.’

The two men shared a look before Ryan dug his phone out of his pocket. 

‘We’d better call Yaz. I think the Lethra are getting closer.’  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Mercurian energy beasts were in a comic with Eleven, Amy and Rory! Apparently they look like giant scary lava monsters but they're actually very nice.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S THE PENULTIMATE CHAPTER GUYS. 
> 
> Also, here's the thing, I am feeling the tiredness in my bones today but I really hope this chapter is okay and it makes sense and it isn't too rushed! 
> 
> Thank you again for everyone who's stuck with this story and left me such lovely messages! We're almost there!

She felt pure, perfect happiness like she’d never felt before. 

It was still dark when Jane opened her eyes, not time to wake up yet at any rate, and Yaz was heavy and soft in her arms, her gentle breath warm against the side of Jane’s neck, fingers curling in the fabric of her pyjamas. 

This felt so right, like she should have been doing this all along, like finally the world was starting to make sense and that feeling of loss she’d been experiencing was banished to their far recesses of her mind. Yaz was everything she’d been waiting for, everything she’d wanted, everything she’d missed. She felt whole and complete all at once and the realisation frightened her. She felt so bonded to someone she barely knew. 

But she did know her, didn't she?

‘You okay?’ Yaz whispered softly, obviously not as asleep as Jane had initially thought, her eyes glinting in the dark as she shuffled closer to the warm body next to her. 

‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ Jane replied, playing with the long loose strands of Yaz’s hair. ‘Just thinking.’

‘About what?’

‘About you.’

‘Good things?’

Jane wriggled herself closer to Yaz so the two women were practically pressed against each other’s fronts and pulled her tighter, kissing her slowly and lazily, feet tangling together, a rush of heat pooling between her legs. 

‘I feel like I’ve met you before, is that weird?’ Jane whispered, fingers gently tracing the outline of Yaz’s hip, trying to ignore the primal urge to seek out the soft skin underneath and explore it with her fingers and mouth. 

‘I know what you mean,’ Yaz whispered back. 

They kissed again and Jane felt herself slowly drifting off, content to rest her head against the other woman’s and feel the beat of her heart under her fingertips.

Just before sleep took her she could have sworn she heard Yaz whisper ‘I’ve missed this so much,’ but that wouldn’t make any sense, would it?

For the first time in months, she slept soundly.

* * *

The day passed in a blur for Jane. She felt as though she was still riding the high of the previous evening. She’d spent the night wrapped up in Yaz’s arms and had woken up feeling as though she’d actually been able to  _ sleep.  _ As though just the presence of Yaz in her bed had relaxed her mind and kept the bad dreams at bay.

They’d been woken up by Yaz’s phone ringing and she’d gone off to answer it while Jane pulled herself out of bed to make them breakfast. Yaz had come back looking worried, twisting her phone in her hands but she hadn’t said what was wrong and had distracted Jane by pressing her against the wall to kiss her, fingers in her hair, body flush against hers as they moaned into each other’s mouths.

There had been a lot of kissing that morning. 

Yaz had insisted on walking Jane to work but it was as though she was on high alert, her eyes constantly darting from side to side, never relaxing, always searching. Jane supposed that came from being a police officer, but in a way she understood. There was something crawling under her skin that not even Yaz’s presence could completely erase, a sense of unease as though something was coming, something dangerous. She felt an overwhelming urge to protect Yaz but couldn’t say why, couldn’t say what she wanted to protect her from. Some nameless, terrifying  _ thing  _ that was lurking in the shadows. 

Alone in her classroom, Jane pulled the fob watch from her pocket and looked at it, tracing the circular patterns on the front carefully with her thumb, wondering what they meant. She felt as though, in a weird way, she could almost understand them, as though the translation was there on the tip of her tongue. 

Yaz had insisted that she bring it with her today, although she’d been very elusive on  _ why  _ it was so important that she did, making Jane promise that she’d keep it on her at all times, as though it was something precious that had to be protected. The watch was warm in her hands but every time she touched it she felt that  _ fear.  _ Not for herself, but for others. She felt a shiver travel up her spine and she tucked it back into her pocket, out of sight, out of mind. 

* * *

Meanwhile, Graham and Yaz had scooped up a sample of the goo left by the Lethra and were experimenting with it while Ryan watched the school. They’d tried burning it, freezing it, stabbing it, yelling at it and boiling it but it had had no effect, the goo staying stubbornly intact.

‘Maybe that’s why the Doc went to such extremes to get away from it,’ Graham said. ‘If these creatures are indestructible then what else could she have done?’

‘She said they looked like snakes,’ Yaz said thoughtfully. ‘When are snakes vulnerable, do they even have any weaknesses?’

‘When they’re eating!’ Graham said. ‘I heard that on the discovery channel. They’re only afraid of other animals that aren’t susceptible to their venom. Problem is, we already know humans are cause of that poor bloke. Even the concrete isn’t safe, I’m going to have to get a builder in to repair my paving slab.’

‘I wish the hologram was still working,’ Yaz complained, rubbing her eyes. ‘Although I doubt even Holo-Doc would tell us how to injure another creature, evil or not.’

She reached up to the cupboard to get a mug out of it, deciding tea was in order after a day of trying to destroy a seemingly indestructible pile of goo.

A bag of salt fell out of the counter as soon as she opened it and spilled onto the surface, the granules going everywhere.

‘Oh for -’

Yaz brushed them off her clothes while Graham muttered something about  _ making sure Ryan puts things away properly  _ when suddenly the air was filled with a putrid smell and a fizzing sound began to assault their ears. 

They looked down at the little petri dish on the side which contained the alien venom.

The venom which was currently being  _ dissolved  _ by the salt.

‘Maybe,’ Graham said thoughtfully as they watched wide-eyed until the goo had completely disappeared. ‘They’re more like slugs, than snakes.’

* * *

It had been a busy day, but Jane’s heart was still full as she gathered up her things and left the school, already wondering how she could sneakily invite Yaz round that evening without seeming too keen. The ground was still wet from that afternoon’s rainfall but it had stopped when she left the building and Jane breathed in the smell of the clear air, enjoying the sound her boots made as she walked through the puddles.

_ It means the smell of dust after rain. _

_ What does? _

_ Petrichor. _

_ But I didn't ask -? _

_ Not yet. But you will.  _

The voices sprang into her head and Jane realised she’d been clutching the watch in her hand as she walked. They made her feel sad, those voices, and she tugged the watch out of her pocket again to look at it, pausing on the pavement as she blinked in confusion, a memory so close behind her eyes she could almost see it… 

_ It’s so very nice to meet you.  _

A car drove past and she had to sidestep quickly out of the way to avoid being caught in the spray from its wheels, dropping the watch back into her pocket as she continued walking thoughtfully, feeling lost in her own little world. 

If she’d been paying attention, she may noticed the two massive creatures slithering up behind her. As it was, she only realised she was in danger when a shadow fell over her and a sudden stab of panic resonated through her body. A voice in her head screamed  _ RUN!  _ and she tried to obey it but was too late. She felt a thick tendril wrap around her body and over her mouth before she had a chance to scream for help. The air was choked out of her as she was squeezed uncomfortably tight and bright spots appeared in front of her eyes as her lungs screamed out for oxygen, her body going slack in the creature’s grip, unable to fight, unable to run, completely defenceless.

She thought she heard someone yell behind her but then everything went dark. 

* * *

Yaz’s phone rang as Graham was scooping up all the salt to put back in the bag and Ryan’s panicked voice filled the room before she even had a chance to say ‘hello.’

_ ‘They’ve got the Doctor! I wasn’t fast enough, they grabbed her on the way back from school.’ _

‘We’re coming!’ Yaz cried, snatching up the now half-empty bag of salt, Graham already running for the front door as she grabbed her car keys from the table. ‘Where are they going?’

_ ‘Towards the harbour I think, I’m trying to follow but they’re so quick.’ _

Yaz and Graham threw themselves into the car and Yaz floored it, speeding through the streets, grateful they’d miss the worst of the traffic as they headed downtown, pausing only to pick up Ryan on the way when they saw him running at the side of the road. 

‘Why do you have salt?’ Ryan asked, confused at the bag Graham was clinging to.

Yaz swore and skidded the car when they reached the waterfront and a barrier prevented her from going any further, the three of them diving out and running for the water, Graham and Ryan sliding on the slippery cobblestones.

‘I don’t see her!’ Ryan yelled.

‘There!’ Graham said pointing. ‘She’s over there!’

Yaz’s heart pounded as she saw the massive creature lift Jane high into the air and open its mouth, grabbing the bag of salt out of Graham’s hands as she propelled herself forwards, praying she would make it in time. 

* * *

When Jane came to she was immediately confronted with a creature the likes of which she had never seen before and she tried to scream before realising there was something clamped over her mouth and she was being held up in the air, unable to even kick her legs as the  _ thing  _ put its snout in front of her face and sniffed deeply, eyes burning red, green liquid dripping from its fangs.

It resembled a gigantic lizard, maybe a snake or a bearded dragon. It was several feet taller than her and its long tail was wrapped around her like a serpent’s. It had arms and legs that ended in thick claws and its skin appeared scaly. It smelt like rotting meat and Jane could see what looked like blood under its claws. She tried desperately to wriggle free but the creature tightened its grip and she felt her mind slipping away from her again.

_ Don’t try and move, they’ll kill you if you try and move. _

She heard her own voice in her head, soft, gentle and kind and she tried to listen to it and relax her body, the tip of the creature’s tail moving away from her mouth so she could take in huge gasping breaths as she tried to breathe again.

_ ‘You are a Time Lord,’  _ the creature holding her said, eyes narrowed.

‘A what?’

Jane’s voice was weak and she hated how frightened she sounded as the other creature circled her, sniffing. She was able to recognise the shapes of the buildings around her and the water in front of them, they were at the waterfront. She’d been here once before with Alice when they used to go on long walks together, before that night in the bar, before Yaz.

_ ‘I can detect traces of artron energy about her, but she smells human,’ _ the one holding her hissed. 

_ ‘There is something else,’ _ the other replied, its ugly green head sniffing the air, its claw pawing at her coat pocket where the watch lay nestled.  _ ‘There is something not of this earth about her.’ _

‘Get  _ off  _ me,’ Jane yelled, trying to kick out with her legs, the creature’s foul breath heavy in the air around her, her heart pounding hard in her chest, thudding violently against her ribcage. 

_ ‘These humans are so pathetic. Look how it struggles.’ _

_ ‘Pathetic, yes. But they taste delicious.’ _

The creature’s tongue shot out to lick her cheek and Jane screwed her eyes tightly shut as it opened its gigantic maw wide, rows of sharp teeth filling her vision as it prepared to sink its fangs into her. 

‘Get away from her!’

A blur shot past them and crashed into the serpent, sending the one clutching her sprawling to the ground, hissing and writhing against its assailant, its massive tail unwrapping from Jane’s body.

Jane fell and hit the cobblestones hard, her eyes ringing and her head blurred. She could hear shouting in the distance and the rapidly approaching sound of running feet and she managed to pull herself up onto her hands and knees, nausea rising inside of her. 

_ ‘You are human,’  _ the creature sniffed, and Jane saw Yaz standing over her, protecting her, a bag of salt clutched tightly in her hands. 

‘Yes, I am, and she is my friend,’ Yaz replied. 

‘Yaz, get away,’ Jane mumbled from the floor, reaching for her but falling to the ground, the dirty water from that afternoon’s rainfall seeping into her coat as the world spun violently around her. 

_ ‘You are an associate of the Doctor’s?’  _ the creature hissed, rearing up on its hind legs, its red eyes narrowing. 

‘She isn’t the Doctor,’ Yaz replied. ‘She’s Jane. The Doctor isn’t human. She’s ancient and wonderful and brilliant -’

_ ‘- and frightened of us,’  _ one of them laughed.  _ ‘She turned herself human to hide from us but we found her. We’ll always find her.’ _

‘No, she isn’t,’ Yaz replied, looking down at Jane who was watching her, eyes wide. ‘The Doctor isn’t frightened of anyone, but if I were her? And I was being chased across the universe by creatures who could enslave galaxies upon galaxies with the TARDIS I would hide myself away too. Not out of fright of you, but out of love for the universe.’

_ ‘Do you know where her TARDIS is?’  _ the Lethra hissed, red eyes narrowing.

‘No, I don’t,’ Yaz said, forcing her voice to remain strong. ‘But even if I did, even if anyone knew, they wouldn’t tell you. We all love her too much, we all care about the universe  _ too much _ .’

‘ _ Kill them both,’  _ one of the serpents said to the other, and then everything suddenly happened very quickly. 

Yaz threw the bag of salt through the air, the granules spiralling through the air and covering the two Lethra as one of them dove for Jane, those sharp teeth filling her vision again.

Then something landed in front of her, knocking her out of the way and there was a sharp gasp of pain before screaming filled the air. 

Jane reached for Yaz, pulling her out of harm’s reach as the two serpents began to writhe and twist and  _ melt,  _ the salt burning their skin and filling the air with a foul, putrid burning stench as they seeped into the ground, their strangled screams growing quieter until they were no more, just a steaming pile of goo on the ground as it melted into the concrete.

And then the air was still. 

‘What the hell just happened?’ Jane said, panting, still clutching the other woman.

Then she felt wet against her hand and when she looked down at her friend’s body she saw the blood seeping through her abdomen from the two puncture marks in Yaz’s stomach, the wounds she taken upon herself throwing Jane out of the way.  

‘No…’ Jane breathed as Yaz’s eyes fluttered, her skin an awful grey colour. ‘No!’

‘S’alright,’ Yaz breathed, finding Jane’s hand and squeezing it hard. ‘You’re safe. That’s what matters.’

‘Why did you do it, Yaz?’ Jane cried, tears beginning to fall down her face as she cradled Yaz in her arms, pulling her tight.

‘Because I would do anything for you, Doctor.’ Yaz slurred, her limbs becoming heavy and her eyes starting to shut as the venom took hold of her.

‘Doctor?’ Jane whispered, starting to wonder if the injured woman was delirious. 

‘S’who you are, who you really are,’ Yaz mumbled. ‘You have the watch, right? Please. Open it. You’re safe now.’

‘What watch?’

‘The one in your pocket.’ Yaz tried to sit up but found she couldn’t. She was starting to panic, hot tears spilling down her cheeks, the burning pain in her stomach blocking out everything else. 

‘Please, Doctor,’ Yaz whispered. ‘ I can’t die with you not knowing who I am.’

‘I do know who you are,’ Jane said, tears pouring down her cheeks. ‘You’re Yaz!’

‘Please.’ Yaz’s head was spinning and she felt her strength fading but she still managed to reach into Jane’s pocket and pull the watch out. ‘Please, do this for me.’

‘Yaz, this isn’t the time for that!’ Jane said, knocking it out of her hand. Yaz watched it fly through the air, landing a few feet away from them and she knew it was over, she knew that she wouldn’t see the Doctor again.

‘Just stay with me, Yaz,’ Jane begged. ‘Come on, I’m right here.’

‘I love you, Doctor,’ Yaz said groggily, the corner of her vision beginning to go dark, the burning in her abdomen becoming too much for her to bear. ‘I love you so much.’

‘Yaz, hold on for me. I’m right here, don’t leave me.’

‘YAZ!’

Yaz could faintly hear running footsteps and she opened her eyes to see Ryan sprinting towards them with Graham close behind. He stopped to pick the watch up and threw himself to the ground next to them, pressing the watch into Jane’s hand and holding her thumb over the clasp to pop it open.

‘If you want to save Yaz, open this watch,’ he told her, in a tone that brokered no argument. Then he pressed down on her thumb, and the watch opened. 

Golden light spilled from the timepiece and spiralled into the air, flowing into Jane’s eyes. She winched, as though she was trying to look away, but the light held her enraptured and she stared into the watch, her iris’ glowing golden. She tightened her grip on Yaz and Yaz felt her consciousness begin to ebb away, her eyes closing, her body going slack.

‘Hold on, Yaz.’

Graham sounded very far away and Yaz was so tired, her body so weary. Jane was warm and comforting and, even if she wasn’t completely the Doctor, Yaz knew that both women loved her, and that was certainly something.

The last thing she heard before she let the blackness take her was Ryan’s quiet pleading for her to stay awake and Graham’s muffled sobs.

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GUESS WHO'S BACK BABY. IT'S THE LAST CHAPTER.
> 
> Thank you SO MUCH for all the support while I was writing this, I'm so glad I finally got it finished after having it half written for literally months!!
> 
> I know the tenses at the beginning are a liiiiiiiitle bit weird but I'm just too tired to go through them all and I kind of think it works!!

The Doctor blinked. Once. Twice. Three times. 

Old memories flooded in next to her new ones. Her mind blurred and her eyes burned but suddenly everything became perfectly clear. She felt her second heart start up again, her mind glowing with the aftereffects of the chameleon arch, burning with residual Artron energy. She felt faces, voices and names force themselves all at once into her mind, a universe of knowledge that left her gasping, suddenly she could  _ see. _

There’s voices around her, sobbing, crying, pleading. Her knees are wet and she feels damp, as though she’s sat in a puddle. She’s holding something tightly in her arms but it takes a few shakes of her head for the fog to begin to lift and for her ancient eyes to look about her and take in their surroundings as she worked on identifying the voices of the miserable people around her and whatever that  _ godawful smell  _ is. 

Oh god, she could see.

‘Yaz? Yaz! YAZ!’

The Doctor panicked, realising she was holding Yaz’s limp body in her arms, the puncture marks in her abdomen oozing blood, seeping into her clothes, mixing with the water on the ground. She’s pale, too pale, and the Doctor fumbled for her neck, fingers pressed against her pulse, desperately trying to search for the beats that aren’t there as she struggled to remember the events of the previous few minutes.

‘No, no, no,’ she muttered when Yaz doesn’t wake up and her body goes slack, panic blossoming in her chest. She isn’t ready, she isn’t awake yet, she needs more time to heal.  

She looked up at her friends around her, focusing on their faces while she tried to get her useless brain back into gear, the fobwatch dropping from her hand onto the hard ground. Ryan is squeezing Yaz’s hand, almost lying on her in his attempt to wake her up. Graham looked pale, mouth open, jaw slack, crying silently as though he’d already accepted she was gone.

‘Oh god, is she dead?’ Ryan sobbed next to her, and that snapped her out of it. 

She shook her head, hard, testing, experimenting, rolling the Artron energy around in her mind, seeing how much of it she’d had in the watch, pulling it away from her damaged cells, channelling it down her arms towards her hands. 

‘Come on, Yaz, come on, love,’ Graham said, squeezing her hand tightly, lightly slapping her cheek.

‘Hold onto her, Graham,’ the Doctor said, snapping to it and dropping Yaz carefully down onto Graham’s lap, rolling up her shirt so she could get to her wound.

‘Doc?’ Graham said, looking up at her, her face blurry through his tears, hardly daring to hope. 

‘I’m here,’ the Doctor whispered, although whether she was talking to him or Yaz, Graham wasn’t sure.

She placed her hands carefully over Yaz’s body and the same golden light that was in the watch began to flow from her hands, the excess Artron energy moving into Yaz’s skin and disappearing into the wound, burning golden under her hands, whisps sprilling up in the air around them. Graham and Ryan saw the puncture marks heal before their very eyes, shrinking until they were no longer there, the colour returning to Yaz’s cheeks, her pulse getting stronger by the second as the energy destroyed the venom inside her. 

Then a tear dropped from the Doctor’s eye onto Yaz’s face and she opened her eyes.

‘Jane?’ she whispered, looking up at her blearily, face scrunched in confusion.

‘No, Yaz, it’s me,’ the Doctor said, stroking back her hair as the golden light faded from her hands, the only sign that Yaz had ever had an injury being the blood on her clothes.

There was a moment of quiet, of reflection while the four of them knelt awkwardly on the ground, Yaz slowly coming around in the Doctor’s arms, eyes beginning to come back into focus. Ryan held Yaz’s hand and Graham put his own on the Doctor’s shoulder, gripping it tightly, the four of them suddenly filled with exhaustion as the adrenaline wore off.

‘What was that?’ Ryan was the first to speak, shakily rubbing his tired face with his hands. ‘That golden light?’

‘Artron energy,’ the Doctor explained, her voice quiet. ‘There’s a reserve inside the watch. Switching from one species to another is difficult, not to mention painful, so Time Lords packed extra Artron energy into the chameleon arch. I can convert it to regeneration energy, use it to recover faster.’ 

‘Except you just gave it to Yaz,’ Graham said softly, noticing the Doctor’s pained expression, her arms straining as she tried to hold onto Yaz, to keep her safe in her arms.

‘Let me,’ Ryan said gently, moving forward to lift Yaz against him, accepting her weight.  

The Doctor sagged, a hand coming up to grip at her chest, her second heart beating shakily under her fingertips. Graham tucked an arm across her shoulders to support her while she closed her eyes and tried to breathe through the pain of her binary vascular system reasserting itself, her additional alien organs beginning to start up again as the cells in her body burned and her head swam. 

‘Graham...’ she mumbled, face grey, eyes sliding shut. ‘I think I’m going to -’

‘It’s alright, Doc,’ he said gently. ‘I’ve got you.’

She slumped against him as the world went black around her. 

* * *

She woke up in the dark to a hand in her hair and her head resting against someone’s thigh. Her limbs felt heavy, the sweet comfort of sleep not done with her yet; trying to pull her back down.

Her head felt fuzzy and uncoordinated but she could just start to make out voices seeping through her subconscious. She realised her Gallifreyan hearing had regenerated and the sudden transition was painful as the sounds of the three hearts thumping in her three friends’ chests assaulted her ears and she bolted upright, surprising whoever she’d been sleeping on, hands pressed over her ears as she tried to bury the sound. 

A hand on her back didn't help and she cried out at the sudden intrusive wave of emotions flooding through her. Panic, fear, worry, joy. 

‘Yaz, give her a sec, love,’ Graham’s voice sounded, amplified tenfold in her ear, as though he was speaking through a microphone in a cavern and the hand disappeared, the blessed relief that followed almost enough to send her to sleep again.

It took a few moments of deep breathing and meditation before she successfully managed to cover over the sounds that had been so loud to her, the heartbeats of her friends fading away into the background as she focused on the tick of the clock on Graham’s mantlepiece. Time was safe, secure. Time was a constant, time was inevitable. Time was hers. 

‘I’m alright,’ she mumbled, slowly removing her hands from her ears, her hearts thudding back into a normal rhythm, her eyes beginning to go back into focus as she took in the interior of Graham’s living room. The TARDIS was bright and blue and beautiful in front of her, light shining softly through its windows. She could sense the TARDIS singing softly to herself in low power mode, a comforting series of hums and beeps and whistles too quiet for the humans to pick up on. It was kind of in the way though, she couldn’t even see the TV from her position on the sofa. 

‘Just take it slow, yeah?’ Ryan said, sounding unsure but somehow still calming to her addled mind.

She looked up at them, Graham in the other armchair, Ryan sat on the floor in front of her, Yaz on the sofa beside her. They all wore similar expressions of concern but there was something else they couldn’t hide breaking through to the surface. Joy. In its purest form, complete and without exception.

‘You’re pleased to see me, right?’ she said uncertainly, needing to check, and immediately there was an outcry of protest as Ryan pulled himself up from the floor and hugged her at the same time Yaz did, Graham standing up and perching on the armrest of the sofa to rub her back reassuringly. 

‘Don’t be such a daft old woman,’ he told her, Yaz practically crying against her neck.

‘Why wouldn’t we be pleased to see you?’ Ryan asked her, squeezing her hand tightly.

‘I just thought, cause of Yaz, you might be mad at me…?’

‘Yaz is fine,’ the woman in question told her firmly, kissing her cheek and making her flush. 

‘It is really, really good to have you back, Doc,’ Graham told her, squeezing her shoulder again. 

‘Yeah, life round here was well boring without you about,’ Ryan told her, almost accusingly. ‘That hologram in the TARDIS, was that actually you? Like the you in the watch?’ 

‘No. I mean yes, but also no. The hologram was a voice interface, programmed to think and act like me but it wasn’t  _ actually  _ me. Although it’s a pretty good decoy if needed, fools most people.’

‘Most people obviously being you, Ryan,’ Yaz said with a laugh. He glared at her in response. 

‘Do you remember being human?’ Ryan asked and the Doctor nodded, rubbing her eyes, images of Alice appearing in her head. She thought Alice had been what she was missing but she wasn’t, it was Yaz all along. Well. Yaz, Graham, Ryan and the whole of time and space. 

‘I remember it all,’ she said sadly. 

‘Do you remember calling yourself a useless lesbian?’ Yaz asked softly, testing the waters, and the Doctor laughed and pulled back with a grin, the moody atmosphere in the room broken.

‘I was a bit, wasn’t I?’

‘You were doing alright until the perception filter wore off and Yaz showed up,’ Ryan teased, nudging her. ‘Cat is well out of the bag on that one, by the way.’

‘Speaking of…’ Yaz said slowly, giving the two men a meaningful look and they immediately exchanged quick glances and hastily stood up, each mumbling excuses. Although Graham’s excuse about putting the kettle on was more believable than Ryan’s about feeding the fish, especially considering it was four in the morning and he didn't own any.

‘I’ve never seen them move so quick,’ the Doctor said amused, eyebrows raised as Graham made an unnecessarily loud amount of noise in the kitchen. Why pots, pans and, bizarrely, plates had to be involved in boiling the kettle Yaz wasn’t sure but she made the most of it, leaning forwards to kiss the Doctor, pressing her gently back against the sofa, arms looped lightly around her neck as their mouths moved against each other, making up for the time they’d missed together. 

‘I thought you might be mad at me,’ she said quietly when they pulled away, breathless, foreheads pressed together.

‘Yasmin Khan,’ the Doctor said softly, eyes shining. ‘Why would I ever be mad at you?’

‘You told me to stay away from you when the perception filter started wearing off and I couldn’t,’ she said quietly. ‘It was like, as soon as you saw me, I just couldn’t hide from you anymore.’

‘I remember that,’ the Doctor said, brow furrowed as she tried to filter through her human memories. ‘I was on the floor, in the classroom, and I looked up and you were in the doorway and it felt like I’d been waiting for you. It always felt like that. Like I was missing something important, like there was a loss in my life I couldn’t name. I was mourning for a love I didn't realise I’d lost and when I saw you it just made sense, suddenly.’ 

‘I’m sorry I didn't listen to you,’ Yaz said. ‘I’m sorry I stopped hiding from you when I realised you could see me, I just -’

‘Yaz,’ the Doctor interrupted her, squeezing her hands tightly and smiling at her. ‘You have no idea how much I needed you to come back into my life at that moment, and I’m so grateful you did.’

‘I missed you, so much,’ Yaz whispered. 

‘I know. Come here.’

She pulled Yaz against her and they curled up together on the sofa, legs tangling in each others as they stretched out. Yaz pressed her head against the Doctor’s so she could hear that reassuring quadriphasic beat pressed against her ear, the Doctor’s breathing slowing as she fell asleep again.

Ryan snuck his head round the door a few minutes later and stage-whispered to Graham ‘is it safe to come back in again now?’

‘You’re fine,’ Graham said, and Ryan tentatively entered the room to see Yaz and the Doctor cuddling each other, asleep on the sofa, Graham tenderly tucking a blanket over them. 

‘Right, let's leave them to it,’ Graham said, turning the light off and closing the door gently on their two friends. ‘How’re the fish?’

‘Ha ha, very funny.’

* * *

**Epilogue**

‘... and that’s a very quick rundown on what the Eye of Harmony is.’

The children in her classroom all looked at her, wonder in their eyes. There had been more than a few confused glances and double takes that morning when their teacher strutted into the classroom in a ridiculous pair of trousers and a long grey coat, but her usual enthusiasm and charm had won them over quickly, especially when promising them a lesson discussing the issues behind travelling in time and space and, more importantly, how to overcome them. 

‘And it all fits inside a tiny police box?’ Clara asked, eyes wide. 

‘S’not tiny!’ the Doctor said with a grin. ‘It may look small from the outside, but s’not tiny. Do you wanna see?’

The chorus of ‘yes!’ was loud and the Doctor smiled as she wiped out her TARDIS key and inserted it into thin air, turning the key and snapping her fingers.

The blue box shimmered into sight on the carpet and the children lost their minds, clambering to their feet and racing towards it to feel this magical ship that had been in their classroom this whole time.

‘Is it always invisible, miss?’ one of the students asked and the Doctor shook her head. 

‘Nah, usually she looks like this. The invisibility thing is a massive drain on the power so I don’t do it too often, lot of fun though. I keep walking into it when she’s invisible too, bit embarrassing.’

‘Can we go inside?’ Martha asked excitedly, the other children yelling their agreement.

‘Hmm I don’t know, that depends,’ the Doctor said, scratching her chin. She rapped sharply on the doors of the box. ‘Anyone in?’

They swung open and Yaz stuck her head out with a grin. ‘Hiya!’

‘Was she in there this whole time??’ a student asked, awestruck. 

‘She was! You remember PC Khan from the other day, right?’

‘Is she your girlfriend?’ Shakira asked, a typical troublemaker. But if she was hoping to make their teacher blush or get embarrassed she failed miserably when the Doctor exclaimed ‘yes!’ brightly and gestured for them to come inside with a warning of ‘ _ do not touch anything,’  _ kissing a smug Yaz on the cheek as she ducked through the doorway.

‘IT’S BIGGER ON THE INSIDE!’

‘WE’RE IN A SPACESHIP!’

‘Can we go somewhere, miss? Can we can we? Please please please?’

‘Yes, can we!’

‘Pleeeeeease?!’

The Doctor and Yaz exchanged a quick glance and she shrugged. 

‘I’m not taking responsibility,’ she warned the Doctor. ‘You wanna take twenty school-age children through time and space that’s entirely on you.’

‘Can we see Saturn’s rings?’

‘Yes, can we? Please, miss, we’ll be ever so good!’

‘It won’t be like the museum trip where we played hide and seek for four hours!’

‘I’m too soft for my own good,’ the Doctor said with a sigh, tugging the doors closed once all the children were inside and strolling to the console, throwing the lever with a flourish, that familiar  _ vworp vworp  _ filling the room as the TARDIS spun smoothly into the time vortex.

‘THIS IS THE GREATEST DAY OF MY LIFE.’

‘I wanna take a selfie!’

‘It’s like being on a rollercoaster!’

‘No selfies!’ she warned them, wrestling with the controls as the ship gradually came to a stop, Yaz already at the doors ready to open them at the Doctor’s command.

‘Right,  _ do not  _ leave the ship, got it? Or I won’t take you anywhere ever again,’ the Doctor warned them and, after crossing their hearts and hoping to die if they disobeyed her, she nodded at Yaz who opened the doors, the light of Saturn filling the console, the children falling silent as they stared. Phones came out but the Doctor shrugged away Yaz’s concerns. 

‘Who’ll believe them anyway?’ she said, softly squeezing Yaz’s hand when she joined the other woman at the console. ‘I’ll give them this.’

‘You’re good with kids,’ Yaz said gently, tucking her arm through the Doctor’s. ‘Don’t know why I’m surprised, you basically are one.’

That earned her a nudge in the ribs but the Doctor was silent as Yaz dropped her head onto her shoulder, watching as the children sat on the floor, gazing at the rings of Saturn, some of them reaching out their hands as though they were pretending they were in space.

‘Children are the most honest forms of humanity you’ll ever come across,’ the Doctor said. ‘They don’t ask for much. They don't need much. Just love, kindness, compassion. McDonalds, Pizza Hut, the latest Nintendo consoles. They just want to be amazed.’

‘Oh, Doctor,’ Yaz said, kissing her softly. ‘Don’t we all?’

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I could ask just one more time, please leave me a little message!
> 
> Ladybugbear2 - no Hamilton but I am way happier with this ending!

**Author's Note:**

> Love it? Hate it? Let me know!


End file.
